YEMEN Press Agency

Health minister: Number of people with diabetes increased to about one million

SANAA, March 17 (YPA) – Minister of Public Health and Population Wednesday said that during the 7 years of the US-Saudi aggression and siege, the number of people with diabetes increased to about one million.

In his speech during the annual conference of the Yemeni Diabetes Association, Dr. Taha Al-Mutawakel explained that the intense US-Saudi bombing of cities and the food imbalance as a result of the US-Saudi blockade and the economic war caused an alarming rise in the number of diabetic patients.

He also indicated that the aggression is imposing the import of insulin, which needs fast and cool transportation conditions, through the unsafe port of Aden, which is very far from the large population bloc.

“The continued closure of Sana’a airport is a death sentence for hundreds of thousands of patients who need treatment abroad,” Dr. Al-Mutawakel said.

The Minister of Health stressed that the health sector is on the threshold of a halt with the intensification of the fuel crisis and the continuation of the US-Saudi aggression’s piracy of fuel tankers, stressing that the aggression’s piracy of fuel ships threatens the lives of hundreds of thousands of patients due to the inability to reach the hospitals, which are threatened with closure.

He pointed out that the aggression used fuel as a pressure card, calling on the United Nations to impose respect for international law and neutralize the health sector.

Dr. Al-Mutawakel praised the performance of the medical staff during the years of aggression, saying that: The continuation of the medical staff’s work in light of the aggression, the siege, and the cutting off of fuel and salaries represents a basic building block for popular steadfastness and the coming victory.

E.M