Many children who depend on ventilators would not survive an electricity outage in Gaza, a doctor in the region warned, as he painted a grim picture of the situation at his hospital.
In a video released by the Gaza Ministry of Health on Sunday (22), Dr. Fu’ad al-Bulbul, unit head of the neonatal department at Al-Shifa hospital, said that any interruption in the electricity supply would be “catastrophic”.
Most babies who depend on ventilators will die because we can only save one or two babies, but we cannot save all the babies
Dr. Fu’ad al-Bulbul
Al-Bulbul spoke amid concerns that fuel supplies essential to keep hospital generators running and electricity running are dangerously low.
Earlier Sunday, the UN agency that helps Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) warned that its fuel reserves would run out in three days, compromising humanitarian efforts in Gaza.
Al-Shifa hospital’s nursery, which has 45 incubators, predominantly cares for premature babies from high-risk pregnancies, al-Bulbul said.
“Unfortunately, at the moment we don’t have any medical supplies – the essential medicines that are essential life-saving medicines for babies in the first two hours of life,” he said.
Highlighting the severe shortage of essential medicines, the doctor revealed that he had run out of surfactant and used the last bottle of caffeine citrate on Sunday.
The unit is overwhelmed with a large number of cases, most of the babies are seriously ill and the medical team has worked for 18 days straight, leaving them exhausted, he added.
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*Published by Marien Ramos
Source: CNN Brasil
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