The World Health Organization and other global agencies have launched the first oral cholera vaccination campaign in Yemen, aiming to reach millions of people in the war-torn country.

More than 2,200 people have died of the waterborne infection over the past year in Yemen, with another one million suspected cases across the country.

The first phase of the oral campaign targets more than 350,000 people in the southern province of Aden, according to a joint announcement by WHO, the United Nations children’s agency UNICEF, the World Bank and the vaccine alliance Gavi.

Enough doses had been procured to cover all areas at risk in Yemen, WHO said, but talks were still underway with authorities across the country.

“There has been a large allocation of vaccines from the global taskforce… of about 4.6 million doses, so enough doses have been procured,” said Michael J. Ryan, WHO assistant director-general.

Yemen has been since March 25, 2015 under a brutal aggression by Saudi-led coalition, which also includes UAE, Bahrain, Egypt, Morocco, Jordan, Sudan and Kuwait, in a bid to restore power to fugitive former president Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi.

Tens of thousands of Yemenis have been injured and martyred in Saudi-led strikes, with the vast majority of them are civilians.

However, the allied forces of the Yemeni Army and popular committees established by Ansarullah revolutionaries have been heroically confronting the aggression with all means, inflicting huge losses upon Saudi-led forces.

Source: AFP