RAMALLAH, Tuesday, April 2, 2024 (WAFA) - Dominic Allen, the head of the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) covering Gaza, said he was "terrified" of what could happen if the war went on any longer.
He told AFP the situation was "beyond catastrophic" with gaunt and starving people spending their days searching for food, and medicine running desperately low.
The UN agency Chief, who spent a week in the besieged Palestinian territory last month, said even when aid got through the border, there were still major problems getting it to those who need it most, particularly women and girls.
"What I saw across the Gaza Strip is beyond catastrophic. I have been to Gaza many times before this war, and what I saw (this time) was truly heartbreaking. Gaza is dust.”
"Everybody we drove by and many we spoke to were gaunt, starving, hungry and looking frail. Everybody was looking for food,” he stressed.
"We're really worried about pregnant women and breastfeeding women. Doctors and midwives at the Al-Sahaba Maternity Hospital (the only one functioning in the north) say women are giving birth to smaller babies caused by malnutrition, dehydration and fear.
"They're telling us anecdotally that they are seeing no normal-sized babies being delivered in Gaza, an increase in the number of stillborns and neo-natal deaths as well.
"Delivery rooms are overwhelmed. A midwife described women giving birth on the floor because they were at maximum capacity.” "They're having to use thread for umbilical ties," added the UN Agency Chief.
He said that UNFPA has had a number of our suppliers denied entry into Gaza at checkpoints and screenings.
"Access to the north is very challenging... many UN missions to the north have been denied over past months.”
"People are on the verge of famine right now in Gaza. This is caused by a huge backlog in supplies and assistance,” he stressed.
"We brought what they needed the most, the anesthetics, the oxytocin (and other items that need to be kept cold) and put them in the back of our armored vehicle and delivered them by hand to the hospital."
"They're asking for fuel. Their hospitals are running on fumes. One said if a patient needs surgery, they have to take a canister of gasoline or diesel (with them) to run the generator in the operating theatre. They lack some of the most basic items to help support and give safe birth care for mothers and babies."
"There are many thousands of cases of insufficient menstrual hygiene items, really shocking reports of women who have had to fashion their own sanitary products from pieces of tents. So one of the UNFPA's priorities is to get in at scale dignity kits, hygiene kits and menstrual hygiene management kits."
He said that every person he spoke to in Rafah is so fearful about what will come next for a potential ground incursion in Rafah (in the south).
"I left with a real sense of fear about what could come next. If the Emirati Hospital is managing nearly 100 births every single day, what will happen to those pregnant women and babies?” he questioned.
"What will happen to the 1.2 million people currently living and sheltering in Rafah right now? A city that only housed 250,000 before is bursting in capacity.”
"I left Gaza terrified of what could come next for them. When you see small, frail babies cuddled together because there are not enough incubators, two or three in one, the frailty of life is so clear," he said.
T.R.
