Worst Cholera Outbreak In Yemen; Getting Clean Water Is Luxury

Amid fear of further violence and famine Yemen is now grappled with cholera outbreak, the worst one in fact in the world if believed to the authorities of international healthcare system.

UNICEF executive director Anthony Lake and World Health Organization director-general Margaret Chan said at least 1,300 people have lost their lives due to cholera and the death toll is expected to go high further. One quarter among the dead is children.

It is suspected about 200,000 more people are suffering from the disease and the number is rising by 5,000 cases a day.

Yemen director for the International Rescue Committee, Mohamed El Montassir Hussein, said earlier the outbreak has grappled almost whole of the country.

UNICEF spokesman said in the two years of civil war the country’s healthcare system is now at risk of collapsing completely.

Preventing cholera is not tough. It is simple. Experts say to wash hands with clean water, eat boiled or cooked food and drink only clean water.

These three measures are not easy in Yemen. Getting clean water is like a luxury there. The water system has been crippled and there is no electricity. Municipal workers in Sanaa are unpaid for months and rubbish is seen piling high in the street.

A massive response is required and currently the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is providing healthcare to about 20 percent of the cholera cases.