Amid deteriorating sanitation and hygiene conditions and total collapse of the healthcare infrastructure due to the ongoing Israeli genocidal assault, a chickenpox outbreak is ravaging the already weak and emaciated children of the Gaza Strip.
“The Health Cluster is warning of a rise in chickenpox across the Gaza Strip,” the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) reported last week. “In just two weeks, it recorded nearly 9,300 reported cases across more than 130 health facilities. Over half of these cases were in Khan Younis.”
It attributed the surge in chickenpox cases to deteriorating environmental conditions, overcrowding, sanitation and hygiene gaps, alongside the summer season.
“Partners are providing antihistamines, antibiotics, fever relievers and other essential medicines,” the report added. “They are also scaling up water trucking to high-burden displacement sites, intensifying chlorination and enhancing latrine clearing and disinfection.”
It stressed that the current response still requires additional resources, including hygiene supplies, unhindered humanitarian access to affected areas, and sustainable funding to alleviate the suffering of Gaza’s children.
However, Gaza remains critically short of essential medicines despite the October “ceasefire,” which provided for 600 daily aid trucks to enter the besieged enclave. The Israelis have continued their complete siege of the territory, resulting in catastrophic conditions for genocide survivors.
Last week, the director-general of the Ministry of Health in Gaza, Dr. Munir al-Bursh, provided a sobering assessment of the availability of medicines in the enclave. “We are living through a suffocating medicine crisis,” Dr. al-Bursh wrote. “More than 52 percent of medicines are missing, and more than 59 percent of medical supplies are missing.”
“The citizens can no longer find a drink of clean water. The occupation began with killing, and now it kills silently.”
The 600 aid trucks were also meant to deliver food to the genocide survivors. However, only a fraction of that aid has been allowed in, forcing Palestinians to survive on a daily calorie deficit. The lack of food, combined with unsanitary conditions, has made the population extremely prone to disease, with children being the worst affected.
“The rise in reported chickenpox cases is occurring in a displacement environment already marked by severe overcrowding, deteriorating hygiene conditions, and widespread environmental health hazards,” the UN report added.
Gaza’s survivors are grappling with a severe lack of essential amenities, putting them at an increased risk of disease transmission:
Gaza currently has more than 1,600 active displacement sites hosting approximately 1.7 million people, while Site Management Cluster (SMC) coverage remains limited to about 34 per cent, leaving a large proportion of displaced families without regular site-level support and monitoring. Existing SMC alert systems continue to report acute WASH [Water, Sanitation and Hygiene]-related vulnerabilities, including inadequate access to drinking water, limited soap availability, insufficient solid waste management, and overcrowded living conditions, all of which increase the risk of communicable disease transmission.
While global attention has moved away from Gaza, Palestinians continue to suffocate under relentless Israeli bombings, deprivation, the siege, and the conditions of being forced to live in an enclave that has been deliberately made unliveable.
“These risks are further compounded by widespread rodent and ectoparasite infestations, reported in 83 per cent of assessed displacement sites, alongside sewage in streets, accumulated solid waste, stagnant water, and poor sanitation conditions,” the report said.
“During recent site visits, SMC teams also observed that many households lacked appropriate water storage containers and were resorting to improvised solutions, such as storing water in used flour sacks lined with plastic garbage bags (bin liners), increasing the risk of water contamination and inadequate household water storage.
“Combined with overcrowding, poor waste management, and limited access to water and hygiene supplies, these conditions are creating a highly conducive environment for the spread of chickenpox and other communicable diseases.”
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Here we go again: the deadly duo -- Malnutrition = a suppressed immune response; and a waste-polluted environment breeding microorganisms challenging that weak immune system. And the Ziofilth know this and plan for it as a population reducer.
This is absolutely horrible, it never ends and the governments of the world do nothing!!!!!
We are left with a war between Israel and Iran as our only hope for these people? What does that say about the leaders we have???
Perhaps the people of the world can step up and raise a liberating army via gofundme????