Child malnutrition reaches new highs in Yemen: UN

Parts of Yemen are seeing their highest levels of acute malnutrition in children, heightening warnings that the country is approaching a dire food security crisis, the United Nations said in a report.

Drivers of malnutrition in Yemen worsened in 2020, as the coronavirus pandemic, economic decline, floods, escalating conflict and significant underfunding of this year’s aid response have compounded an already bleak hunger situation after nearly six years of war. “We’ve been warning since July that Yemen is on the brink of a catastrophic food security crisis. If the war doesn’t end now, we are nearing an irreversible situation and risk losing an entire generation of Yemen’s young children,” said Lise Grande, the UN humanitarian coordinator for Yemen. According to a UN Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) malnutrition analysis of south Yemen, acute malnutrition cases in children aged below five have increased about 10 percent in 2020 to more than half a million.

Cases of children with severe acute malnutrition rose 15.5 percent, and at least a quartermillion pregnant or breastfeeding women also need malnutrition treatment. About 1.4 million children below five live in south Yemen, which is under the control of the internationally recognised government. The IPC data for north Yemen, which is controlled by Iranaligned Houthi fighters, is not yet available. Famine has never been officially declared in Yemen.

The UN says the country is the world’s largest humanitarian crisis, with 80 percent of the population reliant on humanitarian aid.