At the Republican Hospital in Taiz, kidney patients now get two and a half hours on a dialysis machine instead of the usual four. Doctors know the shorter sessions leave toxins in the blood, but they are rationing fuel and medical solutions to keep the unit open as long as possible. Its director, Essam Mahyoub Dahan, warns that a full shutdown could come within days for the roughly 270 people who rely on it.
The cause is a renewed Houthi siege. Since early October the Iran-aligned group, after gains in the surrounding countryside, has choked the roads into the government-held city in Yemen’s southwest, including the key route to Aden. Taiz lived through a similar blockade in 2015 and 2016.
With the electricity network still in ruins from earlier fighting, every ward depends on generator power. Reserve diesel is gone; staff say they now buy fuel almost daily on the black market at five times the pre-siege price. Some departments have closed, about half of the usual medicines are unavailable and lab supplies have dropped to a small fraction of normal levels.
The World Health Organization reports acute shortages at 42 facilities in the city. More than 1,100 people with kidney failure need dialysis, close to 200 patients are in intensive care and over 150 newborns depend on incubators. Keeping wards and ambulances running takes upwards of 156,000 litres every month. Without it, oxygen plants, water pumps and vaccine fridges could also stop, raising the risk of cholera among displaced families.
The UN and Amnesty International are pressing the rebels to lift the blockade. One WHO partner managed to bring emergency medicines in by a detour, but supplies remain far below need. “Two and a half hours is not enough,” one patient told reporters, describing constant weakness since his treatment was shortened.
