WHO reported that severe fuel shortages are resulting in further disruptions to health care services in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territory.
The agency informed that outages are affecting neonatology, dialysis and Intensive Care Units in hospitals, putting lives at risk, while the injured are dying due to the delay of ambulances.
WHO’s Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus indicated that on Wednesday 90,000 liters of fuel entered Gaza, an extremely insufficient quantity, since the health sector alone needs 80,000 liters per day and 70,000 more are required for water and sanitation.
The authority explained that the serious lack of such resource forces humanitarian organizations to make “impossible decisions,” while physicians must carry out a triage to determine the most critical emergencies.
Adhanom Ghebreyesus urged Israel once again to reopen the Rafah crossing, as most of the fuel was entering through it.
In these complex situations, limited amounts of fuel are allocated to “key hospitals,” such as the Nasser Medical Center, Al Amal Hospital in Khan Younis, and a Kuwaiti field hospital in Rafah.
Fuel was further provided to 21 ambulances run by the Palestinean Red Crescent Society to “avoid a total shutdown of services,” he detailed.
Due to this shortage, Gaza’s European Hospital in Khan Junis has been out of service since Tuesday.
WHO’s director general sustained that the loss of other hospitals in the Strip would be catastrophic.
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