Yemenis turn to herbal remedies as fears mount over COVID-19 toll

As medicines run short and hospital wards overflow, Yemenis are resorting to traditional herbal remedies to protect themselves from coronavirus in a country broken by years of conflict. | An elderly Yemeni man shops for medicinal plants and spices at a market in Yemen's third city of Taez.

Yemen has so far officially recorded under 1,000 cases of the disease, with 257 fatalities, but most clinics are ill-equipped to determine causes of death and there are ominous signs that the real toll is much higher.

The country's health system has all but collapsed since war broke out between the government and Houthi rebels in 2014, and more than two thirds of the population of about 24 million need aid to survive, according to the United Nations.

In the southwestern city of Taez, market vendors stack bags of herbs and spices in front of their shops - from garlic, ginger and turmeric to costus root and fennel flower - at prices much more affordable than modern medicine.

"Many people are coming to buy medicinal herbs to make concoctions believed to be successful in combatting the virus," said one vendor, Bashar al-Assar, at the popular Al-Shanini market.

The remedies are "guaranteed, tried and effective" to strengthen immunity, he told AFP.

The virus crisis is just the latest hardship for Taez's population of more than 600,000, who have long been trapped within the city limits.

While it is controlled by pro-government forces, Taez is under siege from the Houthi who occupy the mountains that surround the city, from where they have launched repeated bombardments.

Taez has so far recorded 50 coronavirus deaths, the second highest for a Yemeni city after Hadramaut's 111 deaths, according to government data.

But patchy accounts from overwhelmed hospitals, and scientific modelling, indicates this is just a fraction of the real impact.

The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine said in a study that, with no mitigation measures in place, there may have been between 180,000 and three million coronavirus cases in the first three months of the outbreak in Yemen.

Its model predicts there could be up to 11 million people infected, with between 62,000 and 85,000 deaths, in an eventual worst-case scenario.

Aid organisations have warned that a full-blown coronavirus outbreak in Yemen would have dire consequences, and called on the international community for support.

The UN raised some $1.35 billion at a virtual donor conference co-hosted by Saudi Arabia in early June, but it fell far short of the $2.41 billion target.

"As the world continues its fight against this global pandemic, it must not forget countries like Yemen that need their support," the World Health Organization said.