At least six hospitals in the Gaza Strip were forced to close due to lack of fuel, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday (24). This is in addition to the hospitals that had to close due to damage caused by air strikes, the institution said in a statement.
“Unless vital fuel and additional health supplies are urgently delivered to Gaza, thousands of vulnerable patients are at risk of death and medical complications as critical services are shut down due to power outages,” the WHO said.
Some of these vulnerable patients include around a thousand dialysis-dependent people and at least 130 premature babies, the institution explained.
Other people in intensive care or needing surgery also “depend on a stable and uninterrupted supply of electricity to stay alive,” the WHO added.
The United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) also highlighted the urgent need for Israel to allow fuel into the Gaza Strip and echoed the WHO in calling for an immediate ceasefire.
“Fuel is of paramount importance for the operation of essential facilities, such as hospitals, desalination plants and water pumping stations,” Unicef said in a statement released this Tuesday.
“Neonatal intensive care units house more than a hundred newborns, some of which are in incubators and depend on mechanical ventilation, making uninterrupted power supply a matter of life and death,” he added.
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Source: CNN Brasil
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