Yemen, in the Middle East, is experiencing the worst humanitarian crisis in the world. Today, over 24 million people, including more than 11 million children - nearly half the entire population of Australia - are in dire need of food, medical treatment, education, water and sanitation.
Since March 2015, more than 12,000 civilians - including 5,000 children - have been killed. On top of this, more than 20,000 people have been injured due to indiscriminate attacks, landmines, improvised explosive devices, and the storage of weapons and explosives in residential areas, by all parties to the conflict.
The actual civilian casualty statistics are likely to be far higher.
Thousands more people have died from illness and malnutrition as a result of constraights to humanitarian aid, as well as the collapse of the economy and key institutions and services. As coronavirus cases surge, an estimated 12.2 million children - and 24 million in total across the country - are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance.
We are doing what we can to provide humanitarian aid to these children and their families, but UNICEF's funding gap is huge and we need your support.
“Today it is fair to say
that Yemen is one of
the worst places on
earth to be a child.”
- Geert Cappelaere, UNICEF Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa
What you need to know:
What is UNICEF doing?
UNICEF is racing to help as many children as we can, as quickly as possible. We are providing children caught in Yemen’s violent conflict with vaccines, clean water, sanitation facilities, emergency food, medicine and much needed medical kits. We’re also working hard to keep children in school by giving incentives to more than 128,000 teachers who have not been paid for over two years and training teachers in how to counsel children whose lives have been ripped apart by war.
What is the impact of COVID-19?
With COVID-19 now spreading across the country, Yemen is facing an emergency within an emergency. Sanitation and clean water are in short supply. Only half of health facilities are functioning, and many that remain operational lack basic equipment like masks and gloves, let alone oxygen and other essential supplies to treat the coronavirus and existing outbreaks of cholera and diarrhoea.
How bad is it?
- More than 12.3 million children are in need of humanitarian assistance.
- Today, nearly 1.2 million children live in active conflict zones in areas witnessing heavy violence.
- Over 2 million children are malnourished
- Nearly two thirds of girls are married before the age of 18
- A child dies every 10 mins of preventable disease
- 2 million children are out of school because of conflict, now with COVID-19 every school is closed