Gaza: Polio vaccination campaign gets underway as attacks on humanitarian aid continue
BMJ 2024; 386 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.q1918 (Published 13 September 2024) Cite this as: BMJ 2024;386:q1918
The UN has begun vaccinating children against polio in central Gaza, as part of a campaign that aims to vaccinate at least 90% of children in the occupied Palestinian territory.
Variant poliovirus type 2 was detected in Gaza’s sewage in June and last month a baby was reported to have been partially paralysed after contracting the disease. This was Gaza’s first polio case in 25 years.1
The World Health Organization and Unicef had pleaded for a seven day humanitarian pause in the fighting in Gaza to allow for polio vaccines to be administered. Instead, Reuters has reported that Hamas and Israel have “agreed to brief pauses in fighting” near vaccination sites.2
Philippe Lazzarini, United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees commissioner general, said, “This is a race against time to reach over 600 000 children across the Gaza Strip in the coming days. For this to work, parties to the conflict must respect the temporary area pauses. For the sake of children a lasting ceasefire is overdue.”
WHO director general Tedros Ghebreyesus added, “Ultimately, the best vaccine for these children is peace.”3
The rise of infectious diseases in Gaza comes amid the collapse of the health system, water shortages, and appalling hygiene conditions.4 Eleven months into Israel’s assault on Gaza, at least 40 000 Palestinian have been killed,5 and much of the health and sanitation infrastructure has been destroyed.6
Attacks of aid workers and missions
While the polio vaccination campaign is now underway, the UN has warned that attacks on humanitarian personnel and missions have continued and are preventing aid delivery.
Lazzarini reported last month that at least 289 aid workers, 885 healthcare workers, and 160 journalists have been killed in Gaza since October. “Many were killed in the line of duty while providing humanitarian or medical care to the injured and the sick. The war in Gaza has broken all existing rules of war. Those responsible must be held accountable,” he said.7
In an update on 30 August, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said that the number of humanitarian missions and movements in Gaza that have been denied access by Israeli authorities “almost doubled” in August. It added that recent mass evacuation orders given by the Israeli military have caused “severe disruptions in the delivery of life saving aid and drastically reduced the availability of safe spaces for aid workers.”
Last week, UN Under-Secretary General for Safety and Security Gilles Michaud said that more than 200 UN staff were forced to evacuate a key humanitarian hub in Deir al Balah, central Gaza, with just a few hours’ notice. He said the timing “could not be worse” as staff were preparing for the polio vaccination campaign.8