GAZA, (PIC)
Heavy rains exacerbated the miserable conditions in the Gaza Strip. The United Nations humanitarian teams expressed grave concern over the deteriorating health situation in light of the continued Israeli raids on various districts of the Strip.
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said that many areas in the Gaza Strip were flooded, worsening the misery of the displaced.
About 1.9 million people in Gaza were obliged to flee their homes and more than half have sought safety in the southern town of Rafah, but conditions there were no less miserable as they were not spared from Israeli airstrikes and ground invasion.
The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) shelters in the south of the Strip are nine times over capacity and scores of people live outdoors exposed to the harsh weather, or in makeshift shelters.
OCHA warned of the difficulty of managing sanitation in crowded shelters.
Infectious diseases
OCHA stressed that in overcrowded shelters, sewage cannot be managed. Combined with the flooding and the accumulation of waste, the conditions have attracted insects, mosquitoes and rats, further compounding risks of disease spread.
Earlier this week the Gaza health authorities said that they had documented 360,000 cases of infectious diseases in shelters and that the actual numbers could be higher.
The United Nations had warned of a public health catastrophe in the Gaza Strip and the spread of deadly diseases and epidemics among its residents, and its relief agency admitted that Gazans were facing bombing, deprivation, disease, and hunger “in an ever-shrinking area.”
Head of the Pediatrics Department, Dr. Ahmed Al-Farra, said, “Many cases suffer from severe dehydration, including what amounts to kidney failure or poor kidney performance.”
He added that there had already been up to 30 cases of hepatitis A, which has an incubation period of up to one month.
“After a month, we would be shocked to see huge numbers of hepatitis cases, which is a very dangerous indicator as it is a disease caused by overcrowding, having invalid foods, and using shared bathrooms”, Al-Farra highlighted.
