The top official for the World Health Organization in Gaza said Thursday that more routes out of the enclave are urgently needed for the medical evacuation of thousands of Palestinians, including children, in need of lifesaving medical treatment.
“There should be more patients going through Rafah into Egypt, but we also want other medical corridors,” Dr. Rik Peeperkorn told reporters in a video call from Gaza. “And the first medical corridor we really want to see restored is the traditional referral pathway to the West Bank and east Jerusalem. The hospitals are ready in the east Jerusalem and West Bank to receive the patients.”
Peeperkorn said under the ceasefire agreement, up to 50 Palestinian patients a day and their companions can be evacuated from Gaza. So far, they have been able to evacuate no more than 39 patients daily. He said it must be scaled up because 12,000 to 14,000 patients are in need of evacuation, including at least 5,000 children. The patients suffer from trauma, heart issues and diseases, including cancer.
Prior to Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, terror attack inside Israel that triggered the war, there were 50 to 100 patients in Gaza referred each day to hospitals in east Jerusalem and the West Bank, mainly for cardiology issues and cancer treatment, Peeperkorn said.
During the first months of the war between Israel and Hamas, nearly 5,000 patients were medevaced through the Rafah crossing into Egypt — and some onto other countries — for treatment.
But once the Israeli military shut the Rafah crossing in early May ahead of its offensive in the southern part of Gaza Strip, the numbers dropped dramatically. From May until the ceasefire went into effect in mid-January, fewer than 500 Palestinian patients were evacuated.
“In the meantime, people, and some critical patients including children, because they couldn’t be medevaced, they were dying,” Peeperkorn said.
Specialized treatment in war-devastated Gaza is difficult. The WHO says only 18 of the Gaza Strip’s 36 hospitals are still partially functioning. Some lie in ruins. Many lack basic supplies and adequate fuel. Critical equipment has been destroyed, Peeperkorn said, and there is only one remaining CT scanner and MRI machine left in all of Gaza.
Health care needs are immense for all Palestinians in Gaza due to physical and psychological trauma, Peeperkorn said. The ceasefire is allowing WHO to scale-up its response to the general population, including plans to bring more beds into some working hospitals, he said. In the weeks since the ceasefire began, WHO has brought in 105 trucks with medical supplies to cover the health needs of 1.6 million Palestinians.
