Anyone visiting al-Dhahar area in Ibb or going to the wholesale market or the public transport station, would smell the foul odors from a distance, and feel the bites of mosquitoes - which are everywhere making the daily living miserable in the area. This created daily suffering for the people who were waiting for help to reduce this hardship.

Tens of street peddlers, dense population, a main marketplace and a station for public transport - all these were elements that created a disastrous environmental condition and a suitable climate for the spread of contagious diseases and epidemics.

A cholera Infestation

The narrow alleys and roads to the backsides of the shops became latrines for the street peddlers, taxi drivers and shoppers, creating an environment conducive for outbreaks of epidemics, such as cholera, which infected many of the street peddlers and the taxi drivers.

Salim Eidhah, one of the street peddlers described the situation in the area as tragic, caused by foul odors and the spread of mosquitoes and disease transmitting insects. The lack of public restrooms for such a large number of people had forced them to defecate in the open along the roads and in the alley ways. This created a terrible hygiene crisis that have led to the infections of tens of people with cholera, acute diarrhea, and malaria.

The peddler confirms that people who have been infected by cholera are mostly street peddlers and the taxi drivers.

Sanitary Conditions.

As usual, the PWP has always been on the lookout for problematic areas that causes people hardships, and works to mitigate risks and reduces hardship. This time, the PWP’s intervention was in building public restrooms, with funds made available by USAID, to clean up the area and to protect all shoppers and visitors alike from the wrath of epidemics.

Ali al-Mua’afa, one of the displaced people who hails from the Governorate of Taiz, said:” following the construction of the public restrooms, there are no foul odors anymore, the hygiene situation is much better, and we haven’t heard of any infection of contagious disease among the street peddlers or the taxi drivers, like we used to hear in the past.