World Food Programme WFP Yemen Situation Report
FOOD SECURITY
Situation
Amal Hussein, 7, whose name means "hope" in Arabic, is weighed at a Yemeni health center in August. (AP File Photo/Hammadi Issa) Even before fighting broke out in early 2015, Yemen was one of the poorest countries in the Arab world. With an average life expectancy below 64, the nation is ranked 177th out of 189 in the 2019 Human Development Index. Over five years of conflict have left thousands of civilians dead and 3.65 million internally displaced . Its impact on the country’s infrastructure has been devastating , with major overland routes and airports severely damaged. Despite ongoing humanitarian assistance, over 20 million Yemenis are food insecure, of which nearly 10 million are acutely food insecure. The coordinated response of the humanitarian community has prevented catastrophe in Yemen. But if these interventions stop or are severely hampered, the situation is likely to deteriorate quickly. Malnutrition rates among women and children in Yemen remain among the highest in the world, with more than a million women and 2 million children requiring treatment for acute malnutrition. Of these children, around 360,000 are at risk of dying without treatment. Access constraints continue to pose a serious challenge to WFP in several areas especially where conflict is intense. Despite access and security challenges, WFP and its partners manage to deliver assistance to the vast majority of vulnerable people in the country. WFP is providing food assistance for those most urgently in need of support in what has emerged as one of the world’s worst hunger crises. The COVID-19 pandemic now poses a new threat to the people of Yemen. The economic impact of COVID-19 on countries like Yemen – struggling with poverty and devasted by conflict – may be more devastating than the disease itself
Provenance
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