War between Israel and Hamas: Houthis attack a commercial ship in the Red Sea, stoking fears of wider war

“We are all sick,” said Samah al-Farra, a 46-year-old mother of 10 who is struggling to care for her family in a camp housing displaced Palestinians in Rafah, southern Gaza. “All my children have a high fever and a stomach virus.”

Although the collapse of Gaza’s healthcare system has made it difficult to keep track of exact figures, the World Health Organization has reported at least 369,000 cases of infectious diseases since the start of the war, using data collected from the Gaza Ministry of Health and UNRWA, the UN agency concerned with public health. for Palestinians – a staggering increase from before the war.

And even the WHO’s extraordinarily high number fails to capture the scale of the crisis: Shannon Barkley, health systems team leader at the World Health Organization offices in Gaza and the West Bank, said cases in northern Gaza, where the war took place are not included. has destroyed many buildings and overwhelmed what is left of the health care system.

The most common diseases sweeping through Gaza are respiratory infections, Ms. Barkley said, ranging from the common cold to pneumonia. Even normally mild illnesses can pose serious risks to Palestinians, especially children, older adults and people with weakened immune systems, given the dire living conditions, she said.

Ms al-Farra said by phone that her family had been sleeping on the ground since fleeing Khan Younis, a town just north of Rafah, a week ago. Ms al-Farra said she and her children had suffered from high fever and persistent diarrhea and vomiting for the past three days.

Like many others in the battered enclave, Ms al-Farra said she and her family had drunk the same stinking water they used to wash themselves.

“When I wash my hands, I feel like they’re getting dirtier, not cleaner,” she said.

Her youngest child, six-year-old Hala, spent most of the past three days sleeping and was too weak to ask for food after going hungry for weeks, Ms al-Farra said. “She used to beg for more food, but now she can’t even keep anything down,” she said. Her 9-year-old son, Mohammad, has been having seizures, probably due to his fever, she added.

The Israeli military announced Monday that it is opening a second security checkpoint at the Kerem Shalom Crossing – on the Israel-Gaza-Egypt border – to screen humanitarian aid entering through Egypt, a measure aimed at increasing food, water and to enable medical supplies. and shelter equipment in Gaza. Aid organizations have done that said that the amount of aid entering Gaza since the collapse of a temporary ceasefire earlier a week and a half ago has been far from sufficient.

Hospitals that are still considered functioning are focused on providing critical care to patients with trauma injuries from airstrikes, said Marie-Aure Perreaut Revial, an emergency coordinator with Doctors Without Borders, who spoke from Al-Aqsa Hospital in central Gaza. But many of these patients receive postoperative care in unsanitary conditions, resulting in serious infections, she said.

And the primary health care system in central Gaza has completely collapsed, she said, leaving those in need of basic medical care without treatment.

“There’s a very big focus on the injured and the injured patients, but it’s the entire health care system that’s just been razed to the ground,” she said.

A Gazan, Ameera Malkash, 40, said that when she first took her pale and jaundiced son Suliman to a hospital in Khan Younis last month, it was swamped with airstrike victims that day. They couldn’t see a doctor.

They tried again the next day, she said by phone, and the doctor told them it was hepatitis A — a liver infection caused by a highly contagious virus that spreads easily through contaminated water. Suliman was supposed to go into quarantine, but there were no more rooms in the hospital, Ms. Malkash said, so they had little choice but to return to a shelter full of thousands of other people.

Last week, Palestinian Authority Health Minister Mai Alkaila said around 1,000 cases of hepatitis A had been recorded in the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian Authority Ministry of Health is based in the West Bank and operates separately from the Ministry of Health in Gaza.

Dr. Marwan al-Hamase, director of Abu Yousef al-Najjar Hospital in Rafah, said on Sunday that his small facility housed hundreds of displaced people and that they slept on floors where wounded people were also being treated. Those floors haven’t been cleaned in weeks, he said, because “we can’t find cleaning supplies.”

Malnutrition has become “out of control” and the number of cases of anemia and dehydration among children has almost tripled, Dr al-Hamase said.

Milena Muir, a spokeswoman for the aid group Mercy Corps, said that when her colleagues in Gaza fled their homes two months ago, they had not prepared for cold and rainy weather. Many had not brought blankets, coats or warm clothing.

Displaced people taking refuge in UN-run shelters share bathrooms without running water. And fecal matter accumulating on the streets can contribute to the spread of disease and further contaminate water sources, the WHO’s Ms. Barkley said.

Firas al-Darby, 17, who attends a UN school in the south, said he had had a fungal infection all over his body for weeks. “Bacteria, filth, diseases and epidemics are everywhere in the school,” he said.

Hala al-Farra also had a rash, her mother said, and lice. Ms al-Farra added that she considered cutting Hala’s hair because she could not afford shampoo.

“I have no idea how I will help my children,” Mr al-Farra said. “I now go knocking on people’s doors and begging for clean water.”

Abu Bakr Bashir And Aaron Bokserman reporting contributed.