Khaberni - The director of Al-Shifa Medical Complex, Mohammad Abu Selmiya, said that the health sector in Gaza has not witnessed any radical change since the ceasefire, confirming that hospitals are still unable to provide basic life-saving services due to lack of capabilities and medical supplies.
Abu Selmiya added on Saturday that hospitals suffer from a severe shortage of medicines, operating rooms, cardiac catheterization devices, and MRI machines, making it almost impossible to provide medical care to patients and the injured.
He explained that the health situation in the sector is still in a "continuous vortex" for more than two years, as a result of the destruction of hospitals and health care centers, threatening the lives of patients and leading to new casualties due to the lack of available treatment and medical care.
He pointed out that the hospital is currently suffering from a severe lack of beds, where the number of beds has decreased from 3500 before the war to only 1500 beds, and the capacity of hospitals has exceeded 200%, which sometimes forces the medical team to place patients on the floor for treatment.
Abu Selmiya noted that existing hospitals are unable to cope with the large numbers of patients and injured, pointing to 42 injured people who need urgent operations, in addition to many operations postponed for two years.
He also mentioned severe shortages in intensive care devices, operating rooms, and dialysis machines, and the unavailability of chemotherapy for cancer patients.
He confirmed that the entry of medical supplies into the sector is very limited, only 10% of the necessary needs have arrived, and the majority of these quantities do not meet the actual need for emergency surgical operations and patients with heart, cancer and neurological diseases.
Abu Selmiya added that the Israeli occupation has destroyed all hospitals in the north of the sector, leading to most primary care centers ceasing operations, while the existing hospitals operate only partially, amid continued suffering due to poor nutrition and starvation.
Abu Selmiya concluded that the situation in the sector is "catastrophic", with the continued suffering of patients and the injured and the inability of hospitals to provide adequate treatment, which increases the magnitude of the humanitarian disaster in Gaza.
