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STORY: GENEVA/ YEMEN CHOLERA
TRT: 03:04
SOURCE: UNTV CH
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATTS
DATELINE: 2 JUNE 2017, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND / RECENT
RECENT, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
1. Wide shot, exterior, Palais des Nations
2 JUNE 2017, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND
2. Wide shot, press briefing room
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Tarik Jasarevic, Spokesperson for the World Health Organisation (WHO):
“373 cases have been confirmed by lab analyses as being positive for vibrio cholera. So the current fatality ratio nationally is 0.8 but we know that there are pockets with a higher level of mortality. Right now the outbreak has spread to 19 out of 23 governorates.”
4. Med shot, journalists
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Tarik Jasarevic, Spokesperson for the World Health Organisation (WHO):
“Right now in Yemen less than 45 percent of health facilities are fully functioning, and at least 274 facilities have been damaged and destroyed. Health workers have been forced to relocate and the ones still in the post have not received their salaries regularly since August 2016. In many districts there are no longer any doctors present, and the providing surgical care to the injured is particularly challenging due to the shortage of specialised health staff. Medical supplies are chronically in a short supply as well. People with chronic diseases, including high blood pressure, diabetes and cancers are slowly dying as they lack access to life-sustaining treatments.”
6. Med shot, journalists
7. SOUNDBITE (English) Christophe Boulierac, Spokesperson for UNICEF:
“In the past two weeks an average of 1,100 children suffering from acute watery diarrhoea are coming, reported to health facilities every day across the country. In the last four weeks, the disease has claimed close to 700 lives.”
8. Close up, journalist
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Christophe Boulierac, Spokesperson for UNICEF:
“We think nearly 40 perf are children. Several children are dying every day because of Cholera in Yemen. We have said already that, but it is very timely to repeat it. The situation in Yemen is a perfect recipe for disaster.”
10. Wide shot, journalists
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Tarik Jasarevic, Spokesperson for the World Health Organisation (WHO):
“There is also an issue of waste collection, there is garbage in the street because civil servants and public services have not been financed, not only health but other parts of the administration. In many places, people don’t have access to basic health services; we know that for mild cases of acute watery diarrhoea, including cholera, we just need ORS, Oral rehydration solution. That is why we are putting those points strategically located in the different areas, but for severe cases where people are losing lots of liquid, we need antibiotics and intravenous fluids.”
12. Wide shot, press briefing room
The World Health Organisation (WHO) is alarmed about the second wave of a cholera outbreak in Yemen where since April 22 until yesterday close to 70, 000 cholera cases were reported with nearly 600 fatalities
Speaking to reporters in Geneva, WHO’s spokesperson Tarik Jasarevic said that "373 cases have been confirmed by lab analyses as being positive for vibrio cholera. So the current fatality ratio nationally is 0.8 but we know that there are pockets with a higher level of mortality. Right now the outbreak has spread to 19 out of 23 governorates”.
He added that "right now in Yemen less than 45 percent of health facilities are fully functioning, and at least 274 facilities have been damaged and destroyed”. According to Jasarevic, “health workers have been forced to relocate and the ones still in the post have not received their salaries regularly since August 2016. In many districts, there are no longer any doctors present, and the providing surgical care to the injured is particularly challenging due to the shortage of specialised health staff. Medical supplies are chronically in a short supply as well. People with chronic diseases, including high blood pressure, diabetes and cancers are slowly dying as they lack access to life-sustaining treatments”.
According to UNICEF, the number of suspected cholera cases is expected to reach 130,000 within the next two weeks. Its spokesperson Christophe Boulierac said that “in the past two weeks an average of 1,100 children suffering from acute watery diarrhoea are reported to health facilities every day across the country. In the last four weeks, the disease has claimed close to 700 lives”.
Boulierac added that “we think nearly 40 percent are children. Several children are dying every day because of cholera in Yemen. We have said already that, but it is very timely to repeat it. The situation in Yemen is a perfect recipe for disaster. The collapse of the water and sanitation system, barely functional hospitals."
WHO’s spokesperson Jasarevic explained another problem in the fight against cholera: “There is also an issue of waste collection, there is garbage in the street because civil servants and public services have not been financed, not only health but other parts of the administration. In many places people don’t have access to basic health services; we know that for mild cases of acute watery diarrhoea, including cholera, we just need ORS, Oral rehydration solution. That is why we are putting those points strategically located in the different areas, but for severe cases where people are losing lots of liquid, we need antibiotics and intravenous fluids”.
WHO and its partners are trying to scale up the response. Since the second wave of cholera started on 27 April, more than 150,000 intravenous fluids were distributed in the country and 13 new cholera treatment centres were installed, in addition to 26 that were already set up when the outbreak started in October last year.
