The World Health Organization (WHO) issued a dire warning for Gaza this week, saying that if the humanitarian aid situation is not immediately improved, more Palestinians could die of disease than Israeli’s bombing campaign.
“Eventually we will see more people dying from disease than from bombardment if we are not able to put back together this health system,” said WHO spokesperson Margaret Harris at a briefing in Geneva on Tuesday.
It’s a shocking statement given the already immense death toll after seven weeks of fighting. Even the lower end estimates put the Gazan death toll at above 10,000 – while Palestinian sources this week have said it topped 15,000.
But health authorities are sounding the alarm after all hospitals across the northern half of the Gaza Strip, which faced unrelenting aerial bombardment and a ground invasion prior to the temporary truce which took effect last Friday, have ceased functioning.
Not only have fuel and supplies long ceased to north Gaza, but the sanitation system has collapsed and there has been no drinking water.
According to Al Jazeera, summarizing the WHO spokesperson’s briefing:
She described the collapse…
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