Yemen Crisis
Every ten minutes, a child dies in Yemen. Sporting a population of over 24 million people, the country is currently facing one of the world’s largest humanitarian crises.
In 2012, Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi became president. He faced food insecurity, government corruption, and personal illness. In the wake of his administration, an opposing group – the Houthi Movement – began to forcibly take control of parts of the country. By 2015, Hadi had fled the country. Anticipating an expansion of the Houthi movement, countries surrounding Yemen began air campaigns with the intention of restoring the president to power. Since then, the US-based Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project has recorded over 100,000 fatalities resulting from violence in the area.
For the Yemeni, the fighting has made it hard to receive proper medical attention and essential supplies. Project HOPE, an international healthcare organization, estimates that over 20 million Yemeni are one missed meal away from famine.
The rest of the world has also experienced economic backlash from the Yemen crisis. The British Broadcasting Corporation reports that Saudi Arabia’s oil fields have been disrupted, negatively impacting the global petroleum industry.
More recently, COVID-19 has also ravaged the already weakened country. At the time of writing, the humanitarian information center ReliefWeb records the current COVID-19 mortality rate in Yemen at 27%, 5 times higher than the global average.
Despite the challenges, well-meaning philanthropists have already stepped up to help the country in need. Project Hope documents humanitarians entering the places hit the hardest to provide locals with medicine, surgeries, and education on treating the sick.