Polio vaccine campaign rolled out in war-torn Gaza: Health official
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An unspecified number of children on Aug 31 received their first dose of the vaccination at Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis.
PHOTO: EPA-EFE
GAZA - A health official said a polio vaccination campaign began in Gaza on Aug 31, while an aid worker said a large-scale roll-out would begin on Sept 1, coinciding with a “humanitarian pause” agreed upon by Israel and Hamas.
The vaccination drive was announced after Gaza recorded its first polio case in a quarter of a century earlier in August.
Local health officials, along with the UN and non-governmental organisations, “are starting today the polio vaccination campaign”, Mr Moussa Abed, director of primary healthcare at the Health Ministry in Hamas-run Gaza, told AFP on Aug 31.
An unspecified number of children received their first dose of the vaccination, which involves two doses and is administered orally, at Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis.
Among them was Ms Amal Shaheen’s three-year-old daughter, who was already being treated for pneumonia at the hospital.
“We have been in the hospital for 17 days... I spend all my days worrying about her,” Ms Shaheen said.
“Today, she was vaccinated against polio to protect her, like all the children in the hospital have been vaccinated.”
The World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Aug 29 that Israel had agreed to a series of three-day “humanitarian pauses” in Gaza to facilitate vaccinations, though officials had earlier said the campaign was expected to start on Sept 1.
‘Not a ceasefire’
An international aid worker told AFP that Palestinian authorities had organised a launch event on Aug 31 and that the vaccination campaign was still expected to begin in full on Sept 1.
Cogat, the Israeli Defence Ministry body that oversees civilian affairs in the Palestinian territories, said on Aug 31 that vaccines would be given daily from 6am until 2pm for three days in central Gaza, three days in southern Gaza, and three days in northern Gaza.
“At the end of each regional vaccination campaign, a situational assessment will be conducted for the area,” it said.
The Palestinian Health Ministry distributed a slightly different schedule, with the vaccine programme lasting four days at each location.
The ministry identified 67 vaccination centres – mostly hospitals, smaller health centres and schools – in central Gaza, 59 in southern Gaza, and 33 in northern Gaza.
Poliovirus is highly infectious and most often spread through sewage and contaminated water – an increasingly common problem in Gaza as the Israel-Hamas war drags on.
The disease mainly affects children under the age of five. It can cause deformities and paralysis and is potentially fatal.
The media office of the Hamas-run government in Gaza said on Aug 31 that the vaccination campaign required an “immediate ceasefire”.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that measures to facilitate polio vaccination in Gaza are “not a ceasefire”.
The campaign aims to cover more than 640,000 children under 10 years old.
WHO deputy director-general Michael Ryan told the UN Security Council this week that 1.26 million doses of the oral vaccine had been delivered to Gaza, with another 400,000 still to arrive
The Ramallah-based Palestinian Health Ministry said earlier in August that tests in Jordan had confirmed polio in an unvaccinated 10-month-old baby from central Gaza.
‘100 percent safe’
Mr Bakr Deeb told AFP on Aug 31 that he took his three children – all under 10 years old – to a vaccination point on Aug 31 despite some initial doubts about the vaccine’s safety.
“I was hesitant at first and very afraid of the safety of this vaccination,” he said.
“After the assurances of its safety, and with all the families going to the vaccination points, I decided to go with my children as well, to protect them.”
Mr Abed, the health official, stressed on Aug 31 that the vaccine was “100 per cent safe”.
The war in Gaza was triggered by Hamas’ unprecedented attack on southern Israel on Oct 7, which resulted in the deaths of 1,199 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory military campaign has killed at least 40,691 people in Gaza, according to the territory’s Health Ministry. The UN rights office says most of the dead are women and children.
Incessant Israeli bombardment has also caused a major humanitarian crisis and devastated the healthcare system. AFP