About 70% of the Yemeni people have no access to healthcare services, with those live in the rural areas accounting for the most portion, an official statistic has recently said.
The statistic by the supreme council for maternity and childhood, said while Yemen buys weapons for one billion USD a year, the spending on healthcare is far less than the spending on weapon deals. The spending on health care is not more than 10% of the one billion USD spent on weapons, it said.
About 14 million Yemeni people don't have access to health care and a citizen buys about 95% of necessary health care services, it said, pointing out that the government contributes only 5% to access to such services.
Meanwhile, director of the United Nations Population Fund in Yemen has stressed the importance to focus on family planning services to reduce mortalities among the pregnant women and the children.
Yemen has one of the world's highest mortality rates.
According to official statistics, 365 in 100,000 women die during delivery and 37 in 1000 newborns die a year, with the mortalities blamed on the lack of primary healthcare services.
Yemen has received international award on reproductive health for successes in reducing mortality rate among the mothers and children, health minister, Ahmed Al-Ansi, said.
The minister urged to conduct and develop health planning to bring solutions to all population challenges topped by the fertility rate of 3.8%.