The World Health Organization (WHO) began this Sunday at the center of Gaza Strip the first phase of the polio vaccination campaign in the Palestinian enclave, which will last until next Wednesday with eight-hour humanitarian breaks per day agreed between Israel and Hamas.
The other two phases will take place from September 5 to 8 to vaccinate children in the south of the enclave; and from September 9 to 11, the campaign will end in the north of the Gaza Strip with the possibility of extending it for an additional day in areas that could not be covered.
The Israeli Prime Minister’s Office, Benjamin Netanyahureiterated in a statement on Saturday its willingness to collaborate in this campaign aimed at preventing a polio epidemic in the Gaza Strip, but warned that These humanitarian pauses do not represent a general ceasefire.
“Reports of a general ceasefire for this campaign are false. Israel will only allow a humanitarian corridor through which vaccination personnel can pass; Designated safe areas for vaccine administration will also be established,” the statement said.
The commissioner of the United Nations agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, published this Sunday on his X account the testimony of a Palestinian mother who seemed relieved after your baby will receive both drops of vaccines in an agency clinic.
“I’m relieved,” says one mother #Loop after her little girl received the two drops of vaccines @UNRWA clinical.
1st phase of the #polio The campaign starts in the intermediate zones.
It is a race against time to reach just over 600,000 children in the Gaza Strip in the coming years… pic.twitter.com/72YM8p8LH8– Philippe Lazzarini (@UNLazzarini) September 1, 2024
“For this to work, the parties to the conflict must respect temporary pauses in the areas. For the sake of children throughout the region, a lasting ceasefire is necessary,” Lazzarini demanded.
The clinical coordinator of Doctors Without Borders (MSF) in Gaza, Ramiro García Cantugal, warned that If humanitarian pauses are not respected, “there will be a risk of a terrible catastrophe” because the vaccination points are full of Gazan children.
“Once these humanitarian pauses to allow children to approach health centers are over, we will return to a war context in which there are bombings every day,” García lamented.
They arrived in Gaza 1.26 million doses of oral vaccine (two drops in this first phase of vaccination), as well as the equipment to guarantee the cold chain, with the target to vaccinate 640,000 children under ten and achieve 90% coverage to stop the current polio epidemic.
On August 16, the Gaza Health Ministry confirmed First case of polio in an unvaccinated ten-month-old baby – the first case in the Gaza Strip in 25 years – whose life is already in danger after his body was paralyzed.
Polio is a highly contagious disease that mainly affects young children and attacks the nervous system. This can cause paralysis and, in some cases, death.
