LONDON: More than 1 million children in the Gaza Strip are at risk of contracting poliovirus type 2, a highly contagious disease that can lead to paralysis and even death, as migration and Deterioration of sanitation infrastructure makes the population vulnerable to disease.
The World Health Organization announced plans to send 1.2 million polio vaccines to Gaza after the virus was found in sewage samples taken last month from a refugee camp. in the northern provinces of Khan Younis and Deir Al-Balah.
Although there are no clinical cases of polio so far, WHO regional director Hanan Balkhy warned that “the virus could spread further, including across borders” unless agencies move quickly to vaccinate. the population.
However, any mass polio vaccination campaign in Gaza, targeting 600,000 children under the age of 8, will face many challenges, including the lack of a ceasefire that allows medics to safely enter the country. displaced communities.
“We need a ceasefire, even a temporary ceasefire, to carry out these campaigns,” Balkhy told reporters on Wednesday.
Children under the age of 5, especially young children, are at greatest risk of contracting polio, as many missed the regular vaccination campaign in Gaza before the fighting began on October 7. .
The virus, which is spread through contact with the feces, saliva or nasal mucus of an infected person, attacks the nerves in the spinal cord and spinal cord. the brain, which leads to partial or complete paralysis within hours.
It can also activate the chest muscles, causing difficulty breathing, and can even lead to death.
Polio was eliminated in Europe in 2003 thanks to a successful vaccination campaign. There have been no confirmed cases of polio paralysis in the UK since 1984.
Poliovirus cases have declined by more than 99 percent since 1988, with an estimated 350,000 endemic cases in more than 125 countries, with six reported in 2021.
Of the three types of wild poliovirus, type 2 was eradicated in 1999 and type 3 was eradicated in 2020. By 2022, endemic type 1 remained in only two countries – Pakistan and Afghanistan.
In Gaza, overcrowding, a lack of clean water and sanitation facilities, a deteriorating health system, and the destruction of food facilities have all contributed to the return of type 2, according to Hamid Jafari, WHO's director of polio eradication, on Wednesday. journalism.
The United Nations estimates that at least 70 percent of Gaza's water and sanitation facilities, including sewage treatment plants and sewage treatment plants, have been damaged or destroyed since the start of the conflict. .
In late July, Gaza authorities declared the area a polio epidemic, and blamed the outbreak of the virus on Israel's bombing campaign and the damage it caused to medical system.
The Israeli military began bombing the Gaza Strip in retaliation for an October 7 attack by Hamas in southern Israel. Although the Israeli military insists it does not target civilian infrastructure, schools, hospitals and utilities have suffered extensive damage.
More than 490 attacks on medical facilities and workers, recorded by the United Nations in the first six months of the war alone, have left Gaza's medical system in tatters. Only 16 of Gaza's 36 health facilities are still partially functional.
INNUMBER
1.2 million The polio vaccine WHO plans to send to Gaza to prevent the spread of the disease.
600,000 Children under the age of 8 are the target for vaccination.
70% Some of the toilets in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed.
1.9 million Palestinians in Gaza have been displaced several times since the war began.
Three of these houses are in the north, seven in Gaza City, three in Deir Al-Balah, three in Khan Younis, and none in the southern city of Rafah, according to the Physicians for Human Rights, a non-governmental organization in the United States.
Javid Abdelmoneim, the medical team leader for Medecins Sans Frontieres, who worked at Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza last month, told the organization that “every day July was one shock after another.”
He said, recounting a very sad incident: “I went behind the curtain, and there was a little girl alone who died alone. And this is the result of a collapsed health system. An 8-year-old girl died alone on a trolley in the emergency department.
“In a functioning health system, he would be saved.”
Despite calls from the WHO and other aid agencies for the warring parties in Gaza to allow “full freedom of movement” so that doctors can carry out vaccination campaigns, it seems no closer to the possibility of a cease-fire.
On Wednesday, the Israeli military issued new evacuation orders for several areas in northern Gaza, including Beit Hanoun, Manshiyya and Sheikh Zayed.
Israeli army spokesman Avichay Adraee posted the evacuation order on social media platform X. He instructed the residents of Beit Hanoun to “move immediately” to Deir Al-Balah and Zawayda.
“The area of Beit Hanoun is still considered a dangerous conflict zone,” he added.
Despite assurances that these areas will be treated as safe areas where civilians can take refuge, Deir Al-Balah or Zawayda have been regularly attacked by Israelis in recent months.
The United Nations reported that although there are no safe havens in Gaza, 86 percent of the besieged Palestinians are under Israeli deportation orders. About 1.9 million of Gaza's 2.1 million residents have been repeatedly displaced since Oct. 7.
“Nothing is certain. Everywhere is a potential killing zone,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said at the opening of the UNRWA conference on July 12.
The movement of families in Gaza has made it difficult for aid agencies, already underfunded and struggling to reach affected populations, to find and identify unvaccinated children.
Jafari, a WHO polio specialist, warned that the virus may have been circulating in Gaza since September, as the outbreak offered “good conditions” for its transmission.
Before October 7, polio vaccine coverage in the Occupied Palestinian Territory was estimated at 89 percent, according to WHO.
Even if the planned 1.2 million vaccines are safely delivered to Gaza, it will be a “major logistical challenge” to ensure their deployment, WHO official Andrea King told the BBC.
Vaccines must be stored at a certain temperature from the time they are made until they are given. Getting these cold vaccines into Gaza and keeping them at the required temperature will be a difficult task at the best of times.
WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Wednesday that a ceasefire or at least a few days is needed to protect the children of Gaza.
As of July 7, the WHO recorded an outbreak of infectious diseases, including 1 million cases of acute respiratory infections, 577,000 cases of acute diarrhea, 107,000 cases of acute jaundice, and diarrhea 12,000.
He says that this is due to the lack of clean drinking water and the destruction of the water treatment plant in Rafah, south of Gaza.
