Severe Fuel Shortages Push Taiz Hospitals to the Brink as Newborns and Patients Face Dire Risks

Severe fuel shortages in Yemen’s besieged city of Taiz have forced a major medical facility to slash its operational neonatal incubators from 40 down to 10, endangering newborn babies as weeks of ongoing clashes choke off vital supplies and deepen a compounding humanitarian emergency.

At the Yemeni-Swedish Hospital for Maternity and Childhood, medical personnel are struggling to maintain basic care amidst dwindling resources. “There’s no oxygen, there’s no fuel to run the incubators, to keep the babies warm,” said Nada Ahmed, a nurse in the hospital’s neonatal unit. Nawal Najeeb, a supervisor within the same department, warned that the facility could be forced to halt operations entirely if new fuel supplies fail to arrive. “It will be a catastrophe for the babies, a catastrophe of deaths and disabilities.”

Taiz has remained largely isolated since October 3, following an escalation in fighting between the Saudi-backed government and the Iran-aligned Houthi movement. Clashes and blockages along key supply routes, including the vital Taiz-Aden corridor maintained by Houthi forces, have severely restricted the entry of humanitarian aid, water, food, and fuel, while trapping civilians inside the city. According to United Nations figures, Taiz now hosts nearly half of the 250,000 individuals displaced by the recent wave of fighting.

The public health infrastructure across the city is buckling under the strain. Christian Lindmeier, a spokesperson for the World Health Organization, reported that 42 health facilities in Taiz city are currently facing acute shortages of fuel, oxygen, essential medicines, and medical supplies. Meanwhile, soaring transportation and commodity costs are compounding civilian hardships. Driver Abdullah al-Radfani noted that local fuel prices have surged to 2,000 Yemeni rials per litre.

Fatma Jaffar Shotah, the policy, advocacy, and media manager for Oxfam Yemen, highlighted the severe personal tolls exacted by the crisis, citing a dialysis patient who is now forced to spend two nights at a healthcare center rather than traveling home between sessions because transport costs have jumped from half a dollar to approximately $10. “Fuel shortage inside the city is having catastrophic impacts on people’s lives,” Shotah said.

The crisis extends far beyond the borders of Taiz. The international aid organization Médecins Sans Frontières reported that fuel shortages are triggering widespread power outages at hospitals and primary healthcare facilities across the southern governorates of Aden and Lahj, directly disrupting operations in intensive care units and operating theatres.

Simultaneously, United Nations agencies and humanitarian groups have issued urgent warnings regarding escalating hunger and malnutrition. The World Food Programme estimates that more than 800,000 people have been completely cut off from food assistance throughout Taiz and its surrounding areas. UNICEF spokesperson Ricardo Pires stated that 52,000 of the 168,000 children screened in Taiz so far this year are acutely malnourished, a figure that includes more than 11,500 children suffering from severe acute malnutrition.

While UNICEF has prepositioned nearly 8,000 cartons of life-saving therapeutic food designed to sustain treatment services for approximately three months, Pires cautioned that worsening insecurity and movement restrictions could jeopardize future deliveries and prevent desperate families from reaching treatment centers. Médecins Sans Frontières added that rising displacement from the north and west coast is severely aggravating child malnutrition across southern Yemen, a region already burdened by a long-standing hunger crisis.

Between September 15 and October 22, MSF mobile clinics screened 299 children under the age of five in Aden and Lahj. The screenings revealed that 44 children, or 14.7%, were suffering from moderate acute malnutrition, while 28 children, or 9.4%, were severely malnourished and urgently required hospital care. “In each location we go, on a daily basis, we see at least one or two children who are in severe acute malnutrition,” said Sara Ghanem, MSF’s mobile health activity manager.