Polio vaccination starts in northern Gaza despite obstacles

GAZA STRIP – A campaign to vaccinate a final 200,000 children in northern Gaza against polio began on Sept 10, although health and aid officials said the operation was complicated by access restrictions, evacuation orders and shortages of fuel.

The campaign in northern Gaza, the part of the territory hardest hit by Israel’s 11-month military offensive against Hamas militants, follows the vaccination of more than 446,000 Palestinian children in central and southern Gaza earlier in September.

Medical staff have started administering vaccines

in the north despite a dire need for fuel, among other challenges, said Dr Moussa Abed of the primary care unit in Gaza’s Health Ministry.

Vaccination centres are in areas that are militarily very active, difficult to reach and isolated if things go wrong, said Mr Sam Rose, a deputy director of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, UNRWA.

“There are some nerves, but we’ll have to make it work,” he told Reuters by text message.

On Sept 9, Israel stopped a convoy that included vehicles and fuel for the vaccination campaign, as well as a World Health Organisation (WHO) team trying to get to Gaza’s Al-Shifa Hospital and the mission had to be aborted, Mr Tarik Jasarevic from the WHO told reporters in a briefing.

Israel also issued an evacuation order in northern Gaza, the first in more than two weeks, that included areas part of humanitarian pause zones agreed upon for the polio vaccinations, according to a UN update on Sept 9.

“The centralisation of services in the south makes it extremely difficult for us to get fuel, to get access to vaccinations, and to all other logistics,” Mr Mahmoud Shalabi of Medical Aid for Palestinians, a Britain-based charity, told Reuters via a spokesman, adding there was no fuel available for mobile vaccination teams.

‘Dangers of the road’

Mr Hossam Medhat Saleh, a Palestinian father, said he had to walk with his three children to reach a vaccination clinic because there was no transportation available.

“The dangers of the road are big – as you can see, the destruction, the streets and infrastructure, in addition to the missiles and cannons (shelling) which continue,” he told Reuters, standing on a dusty street surrounded by smashed cars and buildings.

The campaign to vaccinate some 640,000 children in Gaza under the age of 10 began on Sept 1, following confirmation by the WHO in August that a baby was partially paralysed by the type 2 polio virus, the first such case in the territory in 25 years.

The campaign in northern Gaza aims to conclude a first vaccination round, with a second set to commence after a month. REUTERS