Health & Pandemics: Active Crises in 2026

Yemen’s humanitarian crisis is worsening in 2026 as acute food insecurity rises and aid funding falls. UN-backed food security analysis reported that around 18.3 million people — about 52% of the population — are acutely food insecure, including about 5.2 million in Emergency (IPC Phase 4) and around 41,000 in Catastrophe (IPC Phase 5) in some districts of Hajjah, Al Hodeidah, and Amran governorates. UN officials also warned in January 2026 that more than 20 million Yemenis would face acute food insecurity and tens of thousands could face famine-like conditions as humanitarian access becomes more restricted. The crisis is being driven by prolonged conflict, economic collapse, climate shocks, and sharply reduced humanitarian support. The 2026 Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan says over 22 million people need assistance, including 10.95 million women and girls, and it seeks US$2.16 billion; it also estimates 14.4 million people need water, sanitation, and hygiene support, while more than 2.2 million children under age five face malnutrition, including 516,157 with severe acute malnutrition. UN and NGO reporting also says aid cuts are reducing food, nutrition, health, and WASH interventions, with the Food Security Cluster and Nutrition Cluster under severe strain and some health facilities already closed because of funding shortfalls.

Sudan’s health system remains near collapse in 2026 amid the ongoing war, mass displacement, repeated attacks on healthcare, and widespread hunger. WHO reported in January 2026 that more than one third of health facilities nationwide were non-functional, and it reiterated in April 2026 that 37% of facilities remained non-functional across the country’s 18 states. WHO also said the conflict had driven the system to the brink of collapse and left millions without access to essential care. The crisis is being compounded by attacks on hospitals and ambulances, disease outbreaks, and severe humanitarian needs. WHO reported 217 verified attacks on healthcare since April 2023, causing 2,052 deaths and 810 injuries by April 2026; earlier January 2026 figures were 201 attacks, 1,858 deaths, and 490 injuries. The 2026 humanitarian plan says 33.7 million people need assistance, including about 21 million who need health assistance, while outbreaks of cholera, malaria, dengue, measles, and polio continue to strain an already fragile system.

Afghanistan’s health system remains in severe crisis, with 2025 funding cuts causing widespread clinic suspensions and service losses. WHO reported in March 2025 that 167 health facilities had shut down across 25 provinces, cutting off lifesaving care for 1.6 million people, and warned that more than 220 additional facilities could close by June if funding was not restored. Later 2025 health-cluster reporting showed the disruption had widened substantially, with 422 facilities suspended or closed by late June and 445 by December, affecting about 3.08 million people across 30 of 34 provinces. The crisis has also been driven by disease outbreaks and very low immunization coverage. WHO reported more than 16,000 suspected measles cases and 111 measles deaths in the first two months of 2025, alongside outbreaks of malaria, dengue, polio, and Crimean-Congo hemorrhagic fever; measles vaccination coverage was only 51% for the first dose and 37% for the second. WHO’s 2026 Health Emergency Appeal says 14.4 million people need health assistance in Afghanistan in 2026, with funding cuts, disease outbreaks, food insecurity, and climate shocks all worsening the situation.

Malaria remained a major global health emergency in 2024, with WHO reporting an estimated 282 million cases and 610,000 deaths, about 9 million more cases than in 2023. The burden stayed overwhelmingly concentrated in the WHO African Region, which accounted for about 94%-95% of global cases and deaths in 2024; WHO also reports that roughly 75% of malaria deaths in the region were among children under 5. Recent WHO reporting shows the crisis is being sustained by underfunding, drug and insecticide resistance, and service disruptions linked to conflict and access barriers. WHO warned in 2025 that foreign-aid cuts put millions of additional lives at risk and that more than half of malaria-endemic country offices assessed reported moderate or severe disruptions to malaria services. WHO also notes progress in elimination in some settings, with 47 countries and one territory certified malaria-free, but the overall global trajectory remains worsening rather than improving.

The global water crisis remains severe in 2026, with the latest WHO/UNICEF and UN reporting still showing 2.1 billion people lacking safely managed drinking water, 3.4 billion lacking safely managed sanitation, and 1.7 billion lacking basic hygiene services. WHO/UNICEF also reported that since 2015, progress has been too slow to reach universal coverage, even though 961 million people have gained safely managed drinking-water services and 89 countries now have universal access to at least basic drinking water. The burden remains heaviest in poorer and fragile settings, especially Sub-Saharan Africa, where the World Bank says access is improving but remains low in many places, with only 68% of the population in Sub-Saharan Africa having at least basic water services in 2024 and rural coverage far lower. UN and WMO reporting in September 2026 added that 2025 was one of the driest years for river flows in 35 years, with below-normal discharge across 36% of the world’s river basin area, underscoring how climate-driven drought and disrupted freshwater supplies are intensifying water insecurity worldwide.

Gaza remains in a severe humanitarian emergency, with conditions still described by UN agencies as dire despite the post-ceasefire partial improvement in access. OCHA reported in July 2026 that 67% of the population continued to face high levels of acute food insecurity, with 1.2 million people in Crisis or worse and 212,000 in Emergency conditions; the IPC projected deterioration to 1.4 million people in Crisis or worse by the end of 2026. The December 2025 IPC/UN update also said at least 1.6 million people, or 77% of the population, were still facing high levels of acute food insecurity, while more than 730,000 people had been displaced since the ceasefire. The health system remains critically degraded. The UK government’s June 2026 bulletin said at least 94% of Gaza’s hospitals are damaged or destroyed and only about 2,000 hospital beds remain across the Strip. UNICEF’s mid-2026 update said 1.9 million of Gaza’s 2.1 million people were displaced and that access restrictions continued to disrupt humanitarian delivery, including healthcare, water, sanitation, and protection services. OCHA also reported continued movement restrictions, new displacement, and rising risks to food, water, shelter, and sanitation across Gaza in July 2026.

WHO’s latest reporting says more than 1 billion people are living with a mental health condition, and most still do not receive adequate care, with depression and anxiety among the most common disorders globally. WHO also says mental health systems remain underfunded and unevenly distributed, and in some countries up to 90% of people with severe mental health conditions receive no care at all. The access gap remains especially severe in low-income countries, where fewer than 10% of affected people receive care, compared with over 50% in higher-income countries, and WHO says progress toward integrating mental health into primary care remains incomplete. In Europe, WHO said in April 2025 that more than 125 million people in the region live with a mental health condition, but only a fraction receive support because of workforce shortages, under-resourced facilities, and stigma. In the United States, NAMI reported in 2024 that 122 million people live in designated Mental Health Professional Shortage Areas, underscoring the shortage problem even in high-income settings.

Uganda’s 2026 Ebola outbreak is now in an enhanced-surveillance phase after no new cases were reported after 21 June 2026, and the last confirmed patient was discharged on 16 July after two negative tests. WHO says Uganda has recorded 20 confirmed cases and 2 deaths, with all cases reported in Kampala District and no community transmission detected so far. The outbreak is linked to Bundibugyo virus, a form of Ebola for which WHO and MSF report there is currently no approved vaccine or specific treatment, making rapid isolation, contact tracing, and infection-prevention measures the core response tools. WHO reports that Uganda’s cases have been associated with health-care settings and cross-border movement, while most cases in the wider 2026 outbreak have been reported in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where the outbreak has also spread to North Kivu and South Kivu.

Mpox remains an active public health crisis in Africa, with **clade I, especially subclade Ib**, driving sustained transmission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and neighboring countries. CDC says that as of April 2026, the DRC still has the majority of clade Ib cases, and transmission has continued in Central and Eastern Africa, including Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, Malawi, Mozambique, Republic of Congo, South Africa, Tanzania, and Zambia. WHO’s late-2025 outbreak update also reported community transmission of clade Ib in several African countries, underscoring that the outbreak remains geographically broad and not fully contained. Recent evidence shows the epidemic continues to seed international spread. WHO reported in November 2025 that clade Ib had been detected without recent travel in multiple WHO regions, and by that point community transmission was considered established in several countries outside Africa. CDC notes that travel-associated clade I cases have largely been linked to subclade Ib and that these infections have generally been milder, but the DRC remains the epicenter of the ongoing African outbreak.

The global cholera outbreak remains **active and worsening** in 2026. WHO’s February 2026 epidemiological update reported **16,912 new cholera and acute watery diarrhoea (AWD) cases in January 2026** across **19 countries, territories, and areas** in **three WHO regions**, with **182 deaths** and the **African Region** carrying the highest burden, followed by the **Eastern Mediterranean** and **South-East Asia** regions. WHO’s cholera upsurge tracker says the organization still considers the global risk **very high** and continues urgent response operations. By late July 2026, ECDC reported **132,313 cholera cases and 1,556 deaths globally since 1 January 2026**, with new cases reported from **Afghanistan, Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Myanmar/Burma, Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen**. The same update identified the largest case counts in the **Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan, Somalia, Central African Republic, and Malawi**, while the largest new death counts were in **Sudan, DRC, Central African Republic, Angola, and Cameroon**.

Myanmar remains at high risk for measles transmission among displaced and conflict-affected children because routine immunization is still disrupted and large-scale displacement continues. UNICEF’s mid-year 2026 humanitarian report says 1.5 million children under five have missed basic vaccinations since 2018, and by the end of June 2026 UNICEF-supported services had vaccinated 259,370 children against measles in its supported areas. The crisis is concentrated in conflict-affected areas with high displacement and weak access to health care. The Myanmar Health Cluster reported 3.8 million internally displaced people as of 8 June 2026, and said measles risk remains high in Rakhine and Chin because many children there have not received any vaccination in the past five years; the same bulletin says preparedness efforts are ongoing in those states. WHO’s public health analysis also notes that Myanmar’s immunization coverage fell below 50% across all antigens in 2021, and that measles cases were reported in 2024 amid substantial underreporting concerns.

South Asia’s heat crisis remains severe and is intensifying across India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, with recent evidence showing that the April 2026 heatwave in India and Pakistan brought daily maximum temperatures above 46°C in many cities and caused at least 37 heat-related deaths in India and 10 deaths in Karachi, Pakistan. World Weather Attribution said human-caused climate change made that event about three times more likely and about 1°C hotter, while the broader regional monitoring highlights that dangerous pre-monsoon heat is becoming more frequent and lasting longer. The economic and infrastructure impacts are now a central part of the crisis. The World Bank reported in July 2026 that extreme heat is already costing South Asia the equivalent of 31 million full-time jobs each year and could reduce the region’s economy by nearly 7% by 2050, while Bangladesh alone lost an estimated US$1.3–1.8 billion in 2024 from heat-related productivity losses. In Bangladesh, heat has also strained electricity systems, with reports of a 16% generation shortfall during the April 2026 heatwave and rural outages lasting up to 10 hours a day, and more recent reporting in October 2026 shows continued load shedding during renewed searing heat.

Haiti’s cholera resurgence remained active in 2025, though PAHO reported a downward trend in new suspected cases by early September while warning that the threat had not disappeared. Reported activity was concentrated in and around Port-au-Prince and the West department, with ongoing localized outbreaks also noted in displacement sites and several communes; PAHO situation reports listed suspected cases in Ouest, Artibonite, Centre, Nippes, Nord, and Sud-Est, and later surveillance also flagged active outbreaks in Pétion-Ville, Delmas, Belle Anse, Grand Gosier, and Marigot. The most recent verified cumulative figures found are from Haitian health authorities, cited by Human Rights Watch, showing 2,852 suspected cholera cases, 186 confirmed cases, and 48 deaths between January 1 and October 30, 2025. PAHO reported that the Ministry of Public Health and Population, with partner support, expanded response activities across 66 internally displaced person sites, including surveillance, treatment, chlorination, hygiene measures, awareness campaigns, and mobile health services, because insecurity and displacement continued to undermine access to safe water, sanitation, and health care.