Arab News

DUBAI: Yemen’s Minister of Information warned against the Houthi militia’s continued restrictions imposed on child immunization programs and impeding the implementation of  vaccination campaigns in militia-controlled capital Sana’a and all other areas under its control.

Muammar Al-Eryani said the restrictions imposed by the Houthis on child vaccination campaigns threaten the emergence and spread of a number of epidemic diseases which Yemen had previously been declared free of. 

Al-Eryani indicated that the Houthi practices led to the emergence of hundreds of cases of polio, after Yemen was declared free of it in 2009.

Polio reappeared in Yemen in 2019 with an infection recorded in Saada Governorate, and in 2020 the minister said 30 cases were recorded cases in Saada and one in Sana’a.  In 2021, polio spread to other regions, and by mid-2022 160 cases were detected. 

Meanwhile, the Houthi Militia has committed 230 violations to UN-brokered truce on Friday and Saturday in warfronts of Hodeida, Taiz, Dhale’, Hajjah, Sa’adah, Jawf and Marib.