Nourishing Resilience and Resourcefulness in Conflict-Affected Communities

The province of Taiz has hosted active frontlines since the start of Yemen’s conflict in 2015. In 2022, even with a nationwide ceasefire officially observed for six months, the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) project recorded 830 events of political violence across 22 districts of Taiz, resulting in 756 fatalities. By then, Habib’s family had already been displaced by the fighting to the village of Al-Mihal where their living quarters consisted of a single room and bathroom. At the time, Habib was eight months old, and his father was trying to provide for the family by transporting passengers and making deliveries on his motorcycle. On a good day, he brought home an amount equivalent to $5 USD, but many days his income was less. If his motorcycle broke down, they would have no income for days until he was able to repair it. 

When a mobile community health team affiliated with RSD’s nutrition clinic in Taiz’s Al Dhubab district visited Al-Mihal, Habib was one of the children they screened. “My child is always sick, and I don’t know what to do,” his mother told the team. “Every time I’ve tried to treat him, he just gets sick again. We cannot even afford to eat, so how can I afford to keep treating his endless illnesses? Now I just try to feed him some bread soaked in water to ease his hunger.”

After examining Habib, the community health team found that he was suffering from severe acute malnutrition. His ribs were prominent, and his weight was much too low—he was wasting away. The team referred Habib to RSD’s nutrition clinic, where he received free medicines and nutritional supplements. The doctor who saw him confirmed that without timely care, Habib would have been at risk of death or the life-long effects of irreversible stunting. He urged the mobile community health team to follow up with Habib’s case closely and support him with nutritional supplements for four months.

Over that time, the community health team visited Habib and his family regularly and provided the household with rice and fortified soy meal packs in addition to the nutritional supplements. They also supported Habib’s mother with instruction on healthy feeding practices and best practices to protect him from preventable illnesses as well as a hygiene kit to make sure she had the resources to apply what she was learning.

“God sent you to help me,” Habib’s mother told the team. “I used to cry every day when I saw my child in this condition and couldn’t do anything for him.”

Habib’s mother is one of the hundreds of mothers in Taiz who have lacked the resources to help their children thrive in Yemen’s protracted conflict. RSD’s health and nutrition program works as a hand of mercy and hope to strengthen these mothers by equipping them with the material resources and knowledge they need to raise resilient children who can contribute to nourishing interdependent communities in the future.