As Israel steps up its air raids and ground assault in its ongoing war against Hamas, the medical situation in Gaza is growing more and more dire, with the north’s major remaining hospitals warning they’ll soon run out of fuel and supplies. Once they do, a humanitarian crisis that’s already untenable is only expected to get worse.
“If the airstrikes continue, there’ll be these dual forces of bombing, all of the trauma injuries that come from that. And then just as the health system deteriorates … [an] inability to deal with infectious disease, people who need other types of care,” says Yara Asi, a professor of global health management at the University of Central Florida who has studied health care systems in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. “It is a disaster from the top to the bottom.”
The need for quality medical care in Gaza has only deepened following weeks of devastating airstrikes by the Israeli government, which have killed more than 10,000 people and injured more than 25,000, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. These airstrikes are in response to a brutal attack by Hamas on Israel on October 7, during which the Palestinian militant group killed 1,400 people and took roughly 240 people hostage.
As a result of the Israeli government’s airstrikes and full siege on Gaza, hospitals are not just running out of fuel, food, and water, they’re also suffering damage from ongoing bombardment. Solar panels keeping one of Gaza’s largest hospitals going have reportedly been destroyed in the fighting, while other hospitals have suffered extensive structural damage.
That means existing patients, including pregnant people, babies, and people with chronic illnesses, can’t get treatment and are more likely to die as a result. As a doctor in southern Gaza told the New York Times, “The hospital doors are open, but the care we are able to give — it is negligible.”
Additionally, the airstrikes have overwhelmed hospitals with a surge…
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