adequate at all levels in the mid-1980s while recognizing the problems the government confronted in attempting to provide adequate care,” (Krieger 6).
The government tried to offset one of its biggest obstacles to improving health care, a lack of training, a lack of trained personnel in the country, population excess and the biggest obstacle of them all-a shortage of funding to handle the massive problem. Since the government had a shortage of funds, it typically turned to outside sources of funding. However, these outside sources usually directed on what the money should be spent, at least more so than the Yemeni government was able. The government tried to build a health care delivery system that focused on primary care. The system was centralized and hierarchically organized. The system had three levels: “the first level consisted of rural health units where paramedics provided care to residents of small villages; at the second level health centers staffed by physician and medical assistants ministered to local populations up to 15,000 people; the third level consisted of a network of hospitals-31 in 1980,” (Krieger 6). Unfortunately, this was not adequate for the country’s needs, and many of the health units and hospitals were understaffed and did not have funding for proper training or modern medical technology or equipment.
The liberalization of politics in the 1990s has brought many types of programs and reforms to Yemen with concern to health care. The government has a new head of the Ministry of Health and through this body and the cooperation of national and international sources, there have been many new programs and health care initiatives created in Yemen-all geared, of course, to overlapping political policies with health care and population control policies. Up until the 1990s the report card on Yemen health care was in the failed region according to the World Health Organization (WHO), whose ass...