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Yemeni Minister Says Cholera Cases Likely to Increase | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT English Archive 2005 -2017
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A nurse attends to a boy infected with cholera at a hospital in the Red Sea port city of Hodeidah, Yemen May 14, 2017. (Reuters)


Riyadh – Abdulraqeeb Saif Fateh, Yemen’s minister of local administration, said that the number of cholera cases is likely to increase amidst the absence of environmental sanitation, especially in insurgents-held regions – including Sana’a.

The Yemeni minister told Asharq Al-Awsat that the main reason behind the widespread of cholera is that insurgents are acting irresponsibly in Yemen through refusing to disburse salaries for laborers in charge of sanitation and cleaning work even though they have laid their hands on the state’s treasury of around YER500 billion (USD1.7 billion).

He added that thanks to the efforts of Saudi Arabia and Saudi-led coalition in Yemen, access has been successful to some regions where there are cholera cases.

A sufficient amount of medicine and first aid has been sent after the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud launched a campaign to fight the outbreak.

The Yemeni minister demanded again to break the siege on Taiz International Airport and Hodeidah International Airport to permit the access of more medicine and first aid for citizens.

“Although there is an airport in Taiz, the region has been under siege for two years and cholera started to spread. Hodeidah witnesses the death of one child every eight hours due to contagious diseases,” Fateh stated.

The United Nations had announced an unprecedented outbreak of cholera in Yemen.

UNICEF spokesperson Christophe Boulierac said that in one month 70,000 cases of cholera were registered.