All departments of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in central Gaza were crowded with injured and displaced people, at a time when the fuel used to operate the only generator in the hospital was about to run out.
There are only a few hours remaining between infants in incubators and intensive care patients from death, in light of the continued Israeli bombing of Gaza, according to the warning of the hospital’s medical director, Iyad Al-Jabri.
This comes amid medical staff’s fears that Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital will go out of service, like Al-Shifa Hospital and other health sector institutions.
Israel is tightening its grip on Gaza Strip hospitals
Speaking to Sky News Arabia, Al-Jabri warned that “the lives of more than 35 infants in nurseries and about 20 others placed in the intensive care unit are at stake if sufficient fuel is not available within hours.”
Al-Jabri revealed the suffering of intensive care units for newborns in the Gaza Strip, in terms of:
Severe fuel shortages and electricity outages, which may cause the death of children in nurseries who depend on artificial respirators in the first days of their lives, as “this will happen within minutes of the electricity being cut off in their nurseries.” The severe and unprecedented shortage of essential medicines for infants due to the siege imposed on the Gaza Strip since the beginning of the war, which portends a new humanitarian catastrophe.
Al-Jabri touched on Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital specifically, saying:
35 premature babies are at risk of dying in the hospital, due to the inability of medical personnel to serve them due to the fuel being close to running out. Infants in neonatal intensive care are at risk of death, due to frequent power outages. 18 intensive care patients are at risk of death due to the lack of medicines and medical equipment necessary for their lives. 340 patients with kidney failure in the hospital face imminent danger as a result of the successive crises that have devastated medical services, supplies and other necessary materials since the start of the war on the Gaza Strip. All departments of the hospital were damaged due to the continuous bombing in its surroundings, and this greatly affected the operations department, and may cause the hospital to be out of service. The hospital was operating at a capacity exceeding its capacity. It was providing services to about 350,000 people. After the displacement operations, it was required to serve a million people, and the departments became crowded with patients and wounded. Patients residing and displaced in the hospital suffer from a scarcity of food supplies.
Ishaq Sidr: There are no facilities to provide health services in Gaza
The medical director of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital appealed to the international community to help provide fuel and contribute to saving lives in hospitals, especially children, given their need for electric incubators in various parts of the sector.
It is noteworthy that Israel cut off the supplies of water, food, fuel and energy to the Gaza Strip, after the attack launched by Hamas on October 7.
Israel allowed only a small portion of aid to enter through the Rafah crossing, according to an agreement brokered by the United States and Egypt.
On Monday, the Undersecretary of the Ministry of Health in Gaza, Yousef Abu Al-Rish, announced the death of 6 premature infants and 9 in the intensive care unit, due to a power outage to Al-Shifa Hospital, the largest health institution in the Strip, which is subject to an ongoing Israeli siege and bombing.
On Saturday, the work of the Al-Shifa Medical Complex stopped after it ran out of fuel.
2023-11-13 16:28:22
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