Besieged Gaza grapples with healthcare woes

PressTV - Besieged Gaza grapples with healthcare woes:

"Ashraf Shannon, Press TV, Gaza

Hospitals and drug stores are running out of essential medicines and basic medical equipment, a situation that can put the lives of hundreds of patients at risk.
The situation is especially dangerous for chronically ill patients who have to be on medication for long and those requiring emergency operations.

This has led dozens of doctors and medical personnel to hold a protest to call for the immediate and unconditional opening of the crossings to allow the flow of medicines and humanitarian aid into the besieged territory.
Gaza hospitals lack the necessary equipment and medicine to deal with the relatively high number of seriously ill patients. And as movement of people out of the strip is strictly limited those who require immediate treatment outside Gaza are at great risk. Many of these people die before getting the permit to leave Gaza.

A report issued a coalition of 22 international NGOs and human rights groups in late November says the system for issuing exit permits for medical patients was arbitrary, unpredictable and time consuming

But experts say Israel is not the only one to blame for the severe shortage of medicine as they say the Fatah-led Palestinian Authority which receives all the donor money does not send enough medicine to the strip.

The report by the NGOs adds that it is not just medical goods that are failing to get into Gaza, but many other desperately needed goods. It warned that the humanitarian situation in Gaza is in decline on all levels, and requested an immediate end to the siege Israel tightened in June 2007.

PressTV - Besieged Gaza grapples with healthcare woes:

"fptrue | December 26, 2010



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