WHO warns of 'hellish' situation in Gaza due to lack of access after 100 days of conflict

The population of Gaza “lives in hell” after 100 days of a conflict in which there have been 300 attacks on the health network and humanitarian agencies are being systematically hindered from providing aid, said this Monday the director general of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

(Also read: Marches to stop the war in Gaza took over different cities around the world).

“There are patients who undergo amputations that could be avoided, due to the destruction of the health system, and those who suffer from chronic diseases die due to lack of care,” denounced the director general of the WHO, quoted by the daily report of the UN on the conflict.

It indicated that on Friday, after two weeks of lack of WHO access to northern Gaza, A humanitarian mission was finally able to be sent to Shifa Hospital, which sent 9,300 liters of fuel and medical supplies.

Only seven of the 29 planned missions of humanitarian actors to northern Gaza have been carried out so far this yeardue to the limitations imposed by the Israeli authorities, recalled the report of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

“The inspection process (for missions) remains slow and unpredictable, and some desperately needed materials continue to be subject to restrictions without justification”the representative of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) Lucia Elmi lamented in the report.

In the 100 days of conflict since the October 7 terrorist attacks, people have diedAccording to the Gaza Ministry of Health, 23,968 people and 60,582 were injured, while the casualties of Israeli soldiers amount to 186 dead and 1,113 injured.

“The crisis in Gaza is a man-made disaster, compounded by dehumanizing language and by the use of food, water and fuel as a weapon of war,” summarized the commissioner general of the UN Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, also cited by the daily report.

A total of 146 workers from that agency have died in the conflictin addition to 117 journalists and 337 Palestinian doctors, according to the document.

Risk of famine and epidemics in Gaza

UN humanitarian agencies said in a joint statement that increasing numbers of people in Gaza are at risk of famine or contracting deadly diseases.which makes a “faster and safer” aid inflow urgent.

(Keep reading: Israel continues bombing Gaza after 100 days of war: 23,968 dead).

Although limited humanitarian aid has been delivered to Gaza so far, the amounts are “far below what is necessary to prevent a deadly combination of hunger, malnutrition and disease.”indicated the World Health Organization (WHO), the World Food Program (WFP) and the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF).

“Famine will make an already dire situation catastrophic, because sick people are more likely to succumb to starvation and hungry people are more vulnerable to disease,” added WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

According to the agencies, The arrival of sufficient supplies requires the opening of new entry routesclearing more trucks through border checks each day, easing movement restrictions on aid workers, and more security guarantees for people distributing aid.

They warned that “without the ability to produce or import food, the entire population of Gaza depends on aid to survive”which has meant that the almost 2.2 million people who live in the Strip are in a crisis situation or in the worst levels of food insecurity.

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“Virtually all Palestinians in Gaza skip meals every day, while many adults go hungry so children can eat,” the statement stated.

In this sense, Unicef ​​assured that, in the coming weeks, severe acute malnutrition, the most dangerous form of malnutrition for children's lives, could increase compared to pre-crisis conditions by almost 30% affecting nearly 10,000 children throughout the Strip.

EFE