In Yemen, corruption worsened world's worst cholera outbreak
1 / 6FILE - In this July 1, 2017 file photo, a man is treated for suspected cholera infection at a hospital in Sanaa, Yemen. An Associated Press investigation finds that Yemen’s massive cholera epidemic was aggravated by corruption and official intransigence. The investigation has found that both the Iranian-backed Houthis rebels and their main adversary in the war -- the U.S.- and Saudi-backed government that controls southern Yemen -- impeded efforts by relief groups to stem the epidemic.
Relief workers and government officials said they have seen repeated indications that insiders in both the Houthi government in the north and the U.S.-backed government in the south have skimmed off money and supplies for cholera vaccination and treatment and sold them on the black market. In some cases, treatment centers for people who had contracted cholera existed only on paper even though the U.N.
Cholera spread across Yemen in late 2016 and throughout much of 2017 and 2018. It ebbed late last year, but has again picked up in 2019. A new surge in the disease has produced roughly 150,000 reported cholera cases and nearly 300 deaths since the start of this year. The first cholera vaccine drives in Yemen didn't start until May 2018 in the south and August 2018 in the north, aid and health officials told the AP.
The conflict has killed more than 60,000 people and much of Yemen has been on the edge of famine. An AP investigation published in December revealed that factions on all sides of Yemen's war have blocked food aid from going to groups suspected of disloyalty, diverted it to front-line combat units or sold it for profit on the black market.
A former senior official in the Houthi Health Ministry said the concerns over the vaccines' safety were a pretext. Rebel leaders had a list of demands and tried to bargain with U.N. officials for money and equipment, he said. Publicly, the U.N. blamed the change of plans on security and logistical challenges involved in delivering immunizations across Yemen's conflict-torn landscape. A spokesman for the U.N.'s World Health Organization said at the time that delivering vaccines"has to make sense" in terms of the conditions on the ground, adding that the vaccine doses intended for Yemen would likely be re-routed to places that"might need them more urgently.
"The district was gulped up by cholera," said Ibrahim al-Masrahi, a health worker in charge of gathering epidemic surveillance reports. "I am washing my hands of the consequences of these irresponsible actions," bin Hafez's letter said. He told the prime minister that he was"putting the matter between your hands" in the hope the government would"take the necessary measures to use aid in a proper way and create proper work conditions for international and local aid agencies.
In the wake the vaccination campaign in the south, the Houthis broke the logjam in the north. They agreed to allow cholera vaccines into some areas under their control. Immunization drives were launched in three rebel-held districts in August and September 2018. One of those two aid officials said he was told there were nine cholera treatment centers in Aden. He could find only two."The rest didn't exist," he said.
Another study, published in December 2018 in the journal BMC Public Health, called the epidemic"the largest cholera outbreak in epidemiologically recorded history."
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