WHO: Remaining hospitals in Gaza under tremendous pressure

The Regional Director of the World Health Organisation (WHO) for the Eastern Mediterranean, Ahmed Mandhari, said Wednesday that the remaining hospitals in the Gaza Strip are under "enormous" pressure and are providing limited emergency services. Mandhari added, "As health facilities stop working due to the war on Gaza or lack of resources, the organisation's ability to provide health care to the population diminishes at a time when their needs rise dramatically." He explained during a virtual media briefing for the latest regional developments regarding health emergencies in the occupied Palestinian territories and Sudan that the slowdown in the supply of medicines and supplies, the lack of fuel and safe water, the destruction of infrastructure and the loss of employees closed 27 out of 36 hospitals. He added that without access to clean water or safe disposal of sewage waste, people living in crowded spaces are more susceptible to disease, adding that the WHO is witnessing an increase in the rates of dis eases, respiratory infections, jaundice, skin infections and childhood infections, including Measles. He stated that the WHO documented 178 attacks targeting health facilities in embattled Gaza, killing 553 and injuring 696 others, including 22 deaths and 48 injuries among healthcare workers. Regarding the truce in the Gaza Strip, Mandhari said, "While we felt a degree of enthusiasm as a result of the sudden announcement of a ceasefire linked to the release of hostages and prisoners, we see that what the people in Gaza and Israel need is a permanent ceasefire," stressing that the war on Gaza needs a political solution. WHO's representative in the Palestinian territories, Richard Pieperkorn, said all the hospitals in the northern Gaza Strip are out of service and non-functional, adding that the remaining five hospitals that still provide some form of health care cannot be said to be "functional." He added that the eight hospitals in the south of the Gaza Strip are working under intense pressure. In respon se to a question about whether the WHO is working to notify the International Criminal Court (ICC) regarding crimes committed in Gaza against patients and health workers, the Director of the Emergency Programme at the Organisation's Regional Office, Richard Brennan, confirmed, "The World Health Organisation has a system for collecting data about attacks on healthcare facilities, and we have a mandate to do so. "We report this data regularly, and we condemn all of these attacks, but the organisation does not have a mandate to file a case regarding these violations in the International Criminal Court." Regarding the situation in Sudan, Mandhari said Sudan is now facing the "largest" internal displacement crisis in the world, as 6.3 million people have recently been displaced, 12 per cent of the total population since last April 15. Nearly 1.4 million people went to neighbouring countries as refugees. He said the WO is concerned about the rapid spread of the cholera outbreak in Sudan, adding that seven state s have reported suspected cholera cases since the announcement of a cholera outbreak in the Gedaref region on September 26 He confirmed that the organisation is currently supporting a vaccination campaign with the oral cholera vaccine in the states of Gedaref and Gezira, aiming to vaccinate more than 2.2 million people. Source: Jordan News Agency