Thousands of people in Gaza at risk of polio: Ministry of Health

Gaza And Israel Health officials revealed on Thursday that samples of contaminated water in Gaza Polio The virus has been found.

According to the French news agency (AFP), the announcement came following a report issued by a European group, which said that the Gaza Strip Israeli aggression After millions of tons of human waste and debris are badly affected.

Gaza’s Ministry of Health has said that thousands of families displaced by the aggression and now living in overcrowded tents are at risk of contracting the highly contagious disease, which can cripple or cripple the human body. can become

The United Nations health agency launched a global campaign in 1980 to eradicate polio, which is often spread through sewage and contaminated water, but cases have surged in Afghanistan and Pakistan in recent years.

The Ministry of Health says that analyzes carried out by UNICEF, the United Nations children’s agency, show the presence of the polio virus in the area, which has been the target of Israel’s devastating military offensive since October 7. is made

The Israeli Ministry of Health says that poliovirus type 2 has been found in sewage samples in Gaza, which were tested in an Israeli laboratory.

Meanwhile, Gaza’s Ministry of Health said sewage is flowing between tents used by millions of displaced people across Gaza, and the presence of the polio virus is a sign of a new health crisis.

Sewage drains now run between the tents of thousands of displaced people across Gaza, and the presence of the polio virus marks a “new health crisis,” the ministry said.

City officials said this week that wastewater treatment stations have been shut down due to fuel shortages.

Umm Naheed Abushar is already living a health nightmare in her family’s tent in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza, amid soaring summer temperatures in Gaza.

The 45-year-old mother told AFP news agency, “The heat, the diseases, the flies, the mosquitoes and their buzzing, they all hurt us.

‘We can’t sleep at night because of the smell of sewage. My children don’t sleep because they are always sick with some kind of faeces-borne disease.’

UN agencies say hunger has gripped Gaza since the conflict began on October 7, while doctors say scabies, chicken pox, skin rashes and lice are spreading rapidly.

UN agencies have repeatedly warned of the risk of cholera and other serious diseases becoming epidemics in Gaza.

60-year-old Umm Yusuf Abu al-Qamsan also had to leave her home and move to Deir al-Balah, where she said, ‘It is a painful life among garbage and vermin.’

Almost every day they stand in line for the nurse with their children or grandchildren for treatment of diseases or mosquito bites.

“We buy a lot of medicines,” he said. But we don’t know if it is safe to eat or drink. Can we sit or sleep?’

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Deir al-Balah city officials predicted this week that following sewage pumping and treatment stations were shut down, “streets will be flooded” and “diseases will spread.”

He said that 700,000 people who came to the city in search of safety from airstrikes are in danger.

According to 35-year-old Mohammad Al-Kahlot, a garbage bin has been on fire for the past week in al-Mwasi, a large settlement near Khan Yunis in the south, and understaffed emergency services have been unable to put it out.

Al-Mawasi has been bombed several times, including an Israeli attempt last week to kill Hamas military commander Mohammad Zaif and his deputy.

Garbage is an additional hazard, says Al-Kahlot. “We are suffocated by the smell of garbage, smoke and heat,” he said.

Months of continuous bombardment and fuel blockades by Israel have destroyed Gaza’s outdated waste collection system, a Dutch activist group says in a new study.

Local officials reported that ‘Israeli forces are blocking access to three government-run waste dumps in Gaza.’

Pax said he had studied satellite images showing 225 growing garbage dumps in Gaza.

The group says the ‘chemical soup’ of the substance and heavy metals can contaminate water supplies and farms, and ‘ultimately the toxins enter the food chain and end up in humans.’

Packs warned that because the water “can travel long distances”, the threat might extend beyond the affected area.

‘Although the threat to Gaza is inevitable, the region as a whole may soon face serious ecosystem and public health problems.’