The Guardian reports: Ali Muhammad’s entire family are sick. In the months since his home district of Abs in northern Yemen was hit by a cholera outbreak, he has lost both parents and all six of his children have fallen ill.

“Cholera is everywhere,” he said, according to a testimony provided by Médecins Sans Frontières, who are caring for his eldest daughter at a cholera treatment centre in Abs. “The water is contaminated and I don’t drink it. We have tanks, but we don’t get water regularly. The situation cannot be worse.”

As the area grapples with both the cholera epidemic, which began to spread in April, and the impact of the country’s civil war, the life of the qat harvester has become harder and harder. “Everybody is sick and in rough shape, and their poor financial condition does not enable them to move from one health centre to another.

“My father got sick and although we hospitalised him, he passed away. My mother died as well. And I am just like many others.”

The Abs district was the scene of a deadly airstrike by the Saudi-led coalition last August that demolished a hospital supported by MSF, killing 19 people, including one of the aid agency’s staff members, and injuring 24.

Less than a year later, as the ongoing conflict hits an stalemate, creating the largest humanitarian crisis in the world, the MSF cholera treatment centre in Abs town alone is receiving more than 460 patients daily, which is more than anywhere else in the country. [Continue reading…]