GAZA: Doctors in Gaza say patients arriving at hospitals are showing signs of disease caused by overcrowding and poor sanitation after more than 1.4 million people fled their homes for temporary shelters under Israel’s heaviest-ever bombardment.
Aid agencies have repeatedly warned of a health crisis in the tiny, crowded Palestinian enclave under an Israeli blockade that has cut off electricity, clean water and fuel, with only small UN convoys of food and medicine getting in.
“The crowding of civilians and the fact that most schools used as shelters are housing lots of people, it’s a prime breeding ground for disease to spread,” said Nahed Abu Taaema, a public health doctor at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis.
Palestinian authorities say nearly 5,800 people have been killed by Israeli air and artillery strikes that followed the October 7 attack which stormed Israel.
Israel has told everybody living in the northern half of the 45km-long Gaza Strip to move south but its strikes have flattened districts throughout the enclave.
With all hospitals running out of fuel to power their generators, doctors have warned that critical equipment, like incubators for newborns, risks stopping.
The health ministry said 40 medical centres had suspended operations at a time when the bombardment and displacement are putting enormous strain on the system.
The private Indonesian Hospital, the biggest in north Gaza, said on Tuesday it had switched off everything except the last vital departments such as the Intensive Care Unit.
The only other hospital that had still been serving patients in northern Gaza, Beit Hanoun Hospital, stopped operations because of the intense bombardment of the town, the Palestinian health ministry said.
“If the hospital doesn’t get fuel, this is going to be a death sentence against the patients in northern Gaza,” said Atef al Kahlout, the hospital’s director.
In the temporary shelters where displaced Palestinians are crowding with their families hoping for safety from the bombs, people are starting to suffer from stomach complaints, lung infections and rashes, said Abu Taaema of Nasser Hospital.
— Reuters
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