OVERRUN hospitals in the Gaza Strip have just hours of fuel reserves left, signaling that the medical system across the Gaza Strip has now totally collapsed.
Palestine Health Minister Mai al-Kaila announced that 12 out of Gaza’s 35 hospitals have completely closed amid the ongoing conflict with Israel.
This accounts for about a third of all facilities, while emergency rooms across the enclave have been unable to admit new casualties since midday Tuesday.
“The hospital beds are now full and the number of patients in the emergency department has skyrocketed. There is no room for additional patients, and all the care wards are full. We are now using hospital hallways and staircases to treat the injured. We hereby declare that the medical system in Gaza has totally collapsed,” saad ni Mai Al-Kaila, Health Minister of Palestine.
The situation has been compounded by dwindling medical supplies, equipment, and fuel, with current staff being able to maintain only 30-35 percent of necessary treatment capacity, the health minister added.
According to Al-Kaila, as of Tuesday, 65 medical workers were killed in the conflict and over 100 have been injured. Many more are unable to reach clinics due to destroyed roads.
“Now doctors in many hospitals in the Gaza Strip are having to perform emergency surgery in the corridors using the flashlights on their cellphones. This is the worst possible scenario for medical workers that we can imagine. Fuel reserves across functioning hospitals will be depleted within hours, and the medical services will have to completely cease by then,” she added.
Al-Kaila called on Israel to allow access to fuel, medicines, and relief in Gaza and appealed to the international community to help alleviate this dire humanitarian situation.
“We urgently call for increased pressure to be put on the Israeli government to allow fuel, medicine, medical supplies and essential food and drinking water to enter the Gaza Strip, to allow the wounded to be transferred to Egypt or other countries for treatment and to allow medical volunteers to enter the Gaza Strip to replenish the local medical teams,” she said.
A CCTV report citing the Palestinian Health Ministry on Tuesday said A total of 5,886 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and West Bank have been killed, of this number, 5,791 people lost their lives in the Gaza Strip and 95 in the West Bank.
