The Rafah area is now home to more than 50% of Gaza's population, as the humanitarian crisis worsens and people go hungry, according to the United Nations.
The escalation of hostilities in the Rafah area “could have serious implications for more than 1.3 million people who are sheltering in the province,” the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in an update.
Thousands of displaced people are now on the streets of Rafah, as well as the southern city of Khan Younis, “living in makeshift shelters in squalid conditions, with little or no access to food, water, medicine and appropriate shelter,” OCHA said.
The lack of water availability also worsened sanitary conditions.
These are some numbers from the crisis:
- 158 thousand cases of diarrhea, according to the World Health Organization
- Around 50,000 tons of unmanaged solid waste, as estimated by the Gaza municipality
- More than 650 thousand people in Gaza without a home to return to
- 8 million tons of debris generated from the destruction of residential housing, which will take more than 3 years to remove
- Availability of water through municipal wells at one-tenth of their production capacity one day before October 7, 2023
- 15 operational bakeries – with none in northern Gaza – compared to 97 before hostilities began.
Source: CNN Brasil
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