More than 52,000 children screened for acute malnutrition as displacement, rising water costs and disease deepen humanitarian crisis
By Bunmi Yekini
Escalating fighting and fuel shortages in Yemen’s Taiz governorate are threatening water systems serving an estimated three million people, including 1.6 million children, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said on Tuesday.
The agency said renewed violence since September had displaced about 120,000 people to Taiz, accounting for more than half of those newly displaced across Yemen during the period.
Many displaced families have arrived in overcrowded communities with limited access to food and clean water, placing additional pressure on essential services in one of Yemen’s most water-scarce areas, UNICEF said.
Fuel shortages threaten to halt water pumps, while the cost of water delivered by truck has tripled since the latest escalation, making safe water increasingly unaffordable for families struggling to meet basic needs.
Fighting has also disrupted key supply routes, including the Taiz-Aden corridor, contributing to food and fuel shortages and putting essential services at risk of suspension.
The World Food Programme has warned that wheat flour stocks in affected areas of Taiz are nearly exhausted, UNICEF said, adding that 10 of the governorate’s 16 districts had previously been classified at Emergency levels of food insecurity under the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC).
The crisis is particularly severe for children facing malnutrition.
UNICEF said it had screened more than 168,000 children in Taiz this year, finding more than 52,000 acutely malnourished, or nearly one in three of those screened.
The agency said it had pre-positioned nearly 8,000 cartons of ready-to-use therapeutic food to support the treatment of children suffering from severe acute malnutrition.
UNICEF is also providing diesel to keep water-pumping systems serving an estimated three million people operational and delivering emergency water and sanitation services to more than 300,000 people.
The agency warned that deteriorating water and sanitation conditions could increase the risk of diarrhoeal diseases and cholera, which can further weaken malnourished children by reducing their ability to absorb nutrients.
The World Health Organisation has reported that suspected cholera cases across Yemen have tripled in three weeks, UNICEF said.
For displaced children, the worsening shortages have turned access to water into a daily struggle.
Safa, an 11-year-old displaced in Taiz, told UNICEF that long queues and fights over filling water containers had left her frightened.
“Water is a daily struggle; we wait in long queues to fill our jerricans,” she said. “I see people fighting to fill their jerricans, and it gets me terrified.”
UNICEF called on all parties to the conflict to protect children and civilians, safeguard water systems and health facilities, and comply with their obligations under international humanitarian law.
The agency warned that continued disruption of water, sanitation and health services could compound the effects of hunger and disease on children already weakened by years of conflict and deprivation.