Lives of Patients In Gaza Is Associated With Fuel and Electricity
by Maha Othman | Sunday, January 31st, 2010

The siege that Israel has imposed on Gaza Strip in 2007 has greatly harmed the system of health. Many services, specialists, and medicines are not available to the patients of Gaza. As well as, the steadily increasing lack of equipment and medicine in Gaza a result of Israel’s cutting off of electricity and fuel.

Thus, a lot of patients of different ages are suffering. The death, torment and pain is paints the faces of the families of patients in Alshifa Hospital in Gaza strip. There, doctors have no ability to heal those patients because of lack of fuel and electricity. Misery and sadness fill the hearts of their relatives who await their death while the last liters of fuel sit in the stores of hospitals. One of the cases is in the dialysis section in the aforementioned hospital in the room of kidney patients. Ahmed Gondia, 62 years old, who is barely able to talk about his suffering which has increased with the tightening siege and fears that the equipment of the dialysis stop working at any moment due to the shortage of fuel while it transfers the blood into his body. His son Mohamed said, ”if my father does not make the process of dialysis three times every week, he will face a real risk; adding that his father and other patients are subjected to a slow death, especially since the hospital began to reduce the number of times of dialysis for kidney patients. Furthermore there is limited fuel for driving taxis and ambulances, like in the case of my father, to and from the hospital.”

Another patient, 60 year old Fawzya Mohamed, whom suffers from kidney diseases screamed “our lives is electricity …please do not cut power…we will die”. Concerning the head of the dialysis section, Ayman Alsisi, he  confirmed that this section is one of the most important sections in the Alshifa Hospital where kidney patients need to renew the process of dialysis periodically. Additionally, the hospital is working on generators and those generators will stop working soon with fuel nearing depletion. Stressing that they are approaching a real humanitarian catastrophe, Dr. Alsisi affirmed that there are ten pieces of equipment in the hospital that work out of thirty and there is no ability for bringing spare parts in light of the closure of border crossings. But this is reflected in all sections of the hospital.

According to official statistics, there are almost 1500 patients from Gaza Strip near death because of their inability to travel abroad for medical treatment. After the hospitals lost or used up hundreds of medicine in the last year, Israeli siege has prevented the entry of drugs through crossings. Therefore, Palestinian Ministry of Health warns of a health disaster that will threaten the lives of hundreds of patients; especially dialysis patients and heart patients. The custody of children who’ve lost family becomes a crisis. All the activities in the health sector will be stopped and this leads to a real humanitarian disaster and impede on future health services. Frequent power outages also cause damage in many equipment that require a high demand of electricity. And again, spare parts can’t enter to repair equipment or generators.

The ministry has directed an urgent call to the international community, humanitarian institutions, human rights’ advocates, the international committee of the Red Cross and all free honorable men in the world to force the Israeli occupiers to provide fuel to the electricity company to prevent all of such dangerous problems. Also they call to lift the unfair siege which is imposed on Gaza Strip and allow the import of medicines and medical equipments as well as allow the patients to travel for treatment abroad.

Tags: electricity, Gaza, Israel, medicine, occupation, Siege

7:47 pm. Politics.