Ramallah /PNN/
The Palestinian Health Minister, Dr. Mai Alkaila, unveiled distressing conditions prevailing within Gaza's hospitals, particularly at the Shifa Medical Complex.
In a press statement on Sunday, Minister Alkaila highlighted that the Israeli occupation forces are not facilitating the evacuation of hospitals. Instead, they are expelling the wounded and patients onto the streets, leaving them in imminent danger, describing it as not evacuation but rather an expulsion under threat of arms.
She disclosed a catastrophic situation within the hospitals, where patients are dying without receiving their necessary treatments, including children and adults requiring kidney dialysis, succumbing without these critical sessions.
The Minister confirmed the tragic deaths of 12 patients within the Shifa Medical Complex so far, attributing these losses to power outages and shortages of medical supplies, including two newborns.
Additionally, she lamented the dire fate of around 3,000 cancer patients who were undergoing treatment at Rantisi and Turkish Hospitals but have been left to face death after being expelled by the occupation forces.
Minister Alkaila raised concerns about the peril facing all pregnant women, as medical care and services are unavailable. The impending threat of childbirth without any medical assistance is a pressing issue.
Furthermore, she emphasized the distressing plight of patients and wounded individuals unable to reach the Shifa Medical Complex, resulting in many losing their lives due to hemorrhaging or the lack of necessary medications and treatments.
The Minister underscored the severe limitations imposed on medical teams within the Shifa Complex, preventing movement between departments and buildings, as drones fire at anyone moving within the premises.
She highlighted another imminent danger to patients' lives and the potential health catastrophe: the inability of medical teams to bury the bodies of 100 deceased individuals, which have started to decompose within the hospital courtyard. Stray dogs have begun to prey on some of these remains, according to reports from the medical staff on-site, along with the mounting medical waste inside the hospital sections.
Moreover, she emphasized the re-traumatization of patients on Shifa's beds due to the continuous Israeli bombardment that extensively damaged the medical complex, affecting water wells, oxygen stations, gateways, and other facilities. Blood supplies within the sections have deteriorated due to the power outages, rendering medical teams incapable of providing blood units to hemorrhaging patients.
The wounded, patients, and medical teams are not only deprived of essential care but are also devoid of basic necessities, including food and water, with water supplies cut off within the complex.
The immediate solution, as stated by the Minister, requires providing the medical complex with electricity, medical supplies, medications, and fuel, or the safe evacuation of patients for treatment in the Arab Republic of Egypt. The current hospitals in the region are no longer capable of receiving more wounded individuals.
