Sanaa, Yemen – Rajaa Ghirsan, a 50-year-old seamstress from the Houthi-controlled capital of Sanaa, can barely speak or breathe due to severe obstructions in her airway. Her vocal cord paralysis and laryngeal complications have left her dependent on a specialized neck device to keep air flowing and prevent suffocation, which must be replaced every two months at a cost of $100 each time. Having undergone six previous operations in Egypt and India since 2006, she now requires another complex surgical procedure abroad that the conflict-weakened domestic health system cannot provide. After registering with Sanaa's Higher Medical Committee, she spent seven years trying to secure a seat on a weekly flight to Amman, but repeated airport closures and air attacks kept the route out of reach, and she could not afford the long overland journey to Aden. Her daughter notes that while the breathing device helps, it has worn her mother out over years of waiting either for a final operation or for death.
Ghirsan is among countless Yemenis who rely on Sanaa International Airport, the main air link for millions in the north, which has faced repeated shutdowns since commercial traffic was suspended by a Saudi-led coalition in August 2016. Although a UN-brokered truce permitted limited flights in May 2022, subsequent Israeli air strikes in 2025 damaged the facility and destroyed aircraft. In July, Yemeni government forces backed by Saudi Arabia struck the sole working runway to block an incoming Iranian plane carrying a Houthi delegation. Currently, no regular flights operate from the capital, while Aden, the primary southern alternative and seat of the internationally recognized government, has also faced military strikes.
Anis al-Asbahi, spokesperson for the Houthi-run Ministry of Health in Sanaa, reported that a decade of repeated airport closures has impacted roughly 400,000 patients, including 250,000 requiring overseas treatment and over 125,000 cancer patients confronting severe medicine shortages. He added that the disruption has blocked more than 1,600 types of medicine, restricted 12 specific cancer drugs, and left over 40,000 individuals with thalassemia and haemolytic anaemia without necessary iron chelation drugs and intravenous solutions.
Recent months have seen a resurgence of fighting between government and Houthi forces, with the UN envoy informing the Security Council that the nation has slipped back into full-scale war. Aden's airport was struck twice in October, including an incident where missiles landed close to an outgoing Yemenia flight to Cairo. With Sanaa closed, Aden under fire, and recent unrest disabling the airport in the eastern city of Seiyun, northern patients face severely restricted options. Mohammed Shajara attempted to take his paraplegic five-year-old daughter to Tehran for treatment, but they became stranded when the government blocked Iranian flights to Sanaa, and he considers Aden too dangerous given the 14-hour journey across numerous front-line checkpoints.
Others have suffered fatal consequences while attempting the journey. Abdulkarim Abdullah, a 60-year-old kidney failure patient who relied on weekly dialysis in Sanaa, planned to fly to Amman for a corrective procedure before flight suspensions blocked his exit. Turning to Aden as an alternative, his family accumulated about $2,300 for car hire, hotels, security clearances, and plane tickets by selling a car and gold jewelry. Despite their financial sacrifices, Abdulkarim never reached the airport and died on the road to Aden in January.
Fouad al-Haddad, director of al-Jumhuri Hospital in Taiz, confirmed that numerous other patients have died while waiting to travel abroad or while navigating domestic restrictions, noting that closed main roads around Taiz have forced travelers onto hazardous alternative routes.