AL-MUKALLA: Yemen’s port city of Aden, where the country’s latest cluster of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) was detected, was put into a 24-hour lockdown for three days as other Yemeni provinces approved fresh measures to curb the spread of the disease.
Yemen’s health minister announced the country’s first two deaths from COVID-19 on Wednesday shortly after reporting five confirmed cases in Aden.
Ali Al-Walidi, the supreme national emergency committee spokesperson, said on Thursday that the three cases are receiving medical treatment at local hospitals as the Ministry of Health’s rapid response teams are tracing the patients’ contacts. “We called upon residents to avoid markets and mosques and take health precautions,” he said.
Al-Walidi complained about a lack of transparency and cooperation from the Iranian-backed Houthis regarding COVID-19 cases in areas under its
Control. The spokesperson urged the UN bodies in Sanaa to pressure the Houthis to reveal the real number of the cases.
Shortly after the announcement of the new cases, local authorities in Aden ordered a 24-hour lockdown, closing down big malls and markets for two weeks.
In the province of Taiz, local authorities ordered the closing of the province’s borders with other provinces, placing health teams on a heightened alert, banning large gatherings and demanding those who arrived from Aden to isolate themselves.
In the southeastern province of Hadramout, the supreme emergency committee in the province approved a number of measures to stem the spread of the disease, including blocking the province’s borders, imposing a curfew from 9 p.m. to 8 a.m. and urging residents to follow health guidelines.
The committee did not order the closing of mosques nor markets, which attract a large number of people. Local authorities in Hadramout eased restrictions last week after the country’s first case of COVID-19 showed a speedy recovery.
As Yemen is bracing for the spread of the disease, local government officials have sent an appeal to the World Health Organization and international donors to supply the country with vital medical equipment and funds needed for confronting the pandemic.
“There are shortages of ventilators, kits and rapid tests, ” a senior government official in Aden told Arab News, adding that some Yemeni provinces lack Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) testing machines.
“We want to dispatch PCR machines to Socotra and Marib,” he said.
Yemen’s government has renewed its demand to the Southern Transitional Council to revoke its self-rule declaration that paralyzed health offices in Aden and obstructed the government’s efforts to fight COVID-19.
After a virtual meeting on Wednesday, the Yemeni Cabinet warned that the disease would spread rapidly across the country if the council did not allow government offices in Aden to resume duties, urging the council to comply with the Riyadh Agreement.
Fighting has intensified on main battlefields across Yemen despite renewed calls by aid groups and the UN for a humanitarian truce to allow health workers combat the spread of the virus. Local media reported that fighting broke out between government forces and the terrorist Houthi militia in the southern province of Dhale and Abyan’s Mukayras.
