Mortality Rate in Gaza Increases Amid Hospitals Going Out of Service and Medicine Lacking
(AWP) - The mortality rate in Gaza has increased as most hospitals and health centers have gone out of service, while the number of wounded and sick people steadily grows as the ongoing Israeli war on the ravaged Strip enters its seventh month.
A total of 28 hospitals have ceased operating out of the 36 that used to provide round-the-clock medical services to Gaza’s population.
Ahmed Fawzy al-Muqayyad, a doctor at the Kuwaiti Hospital in Rafah, southern Gaza, said that only three hospitals are still operational in the governorate, which now shelters more than a million people.
“The growing mortality rate among patients is due to health facilities and public and government hospitals going out of service. Only three hospitals are left – Abu Youssef al-Najjar, the European Hospital and the Kuwaiti Hospital in Rafah.”
He explained, “The Kuwaiti Hospital, designed to receive 40,000 cases, is under tremendous pressure now. There are over a million people in Rafah. The European Hospital has turned into a shelter for displaced people. The accumulating cases have led to an increase in the death rate. Health services face acute shortages which is causing a rise in deaths.”
Lamya Abu Daqqa, a displaced Palestinian in Rafah, complained that she could not obtain her necessary medicine at the pharmacies, causing her to suffer from continuous high blood pressure.
“It has become rare to find a clinic with medicine. I have been searching for medicine for quite a while and haven’t found it. I had to take alternative medicine that doesn’t work, and my high blood pressure isn’t decreasing.”
She added, “My husband is facing the same issue. His prescriptions are also unavailable in the pharmacies.”