Gaza doctor warns hospitals will soon become 'graveyards'

The head of paediatrics at the Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza warned on Thursday that most of the health facilities in Gaza will soon become "graveyards" if medical supplies are not brought in.

"We are lacking essential medical needs to treat the wounded. Imagine today I had to clean wounds for little children using chlorine and mixed it with water," Hussam Abu Safiya told dpa.

He said that most of the injured are children and that they are doing their best to save them.

"We are using primitive means. Some operations are being done without anaesthesia. Doctors are even carrying out some operations using cell-phone lights due also to lack of fuel to run the generators," the doctor said.

"We have no painkillers and no antibiotics any more," he added.

According to findings from the aid organization CARE, women in the Gaza Strip are increasingly having to undergo emergency caesarean sections without anaesthesia.

Narcotics are not available and hospitals are "completely" overwhelmed, according to a statement by CARE.

The lack of medical care also significantly increases the risk of maternal and infant mortality.

"Due to dwindling food supplies, there is a significant overall risk to the health of Gaza's 283,000 children under the age of 5, as well as pregnant and breastfeeding women," said Hiba Tibi, country director for CARE in the West Bank and Gaza.

As a result of the unprecedented Hamas attack on October 7, Israel's army started retaliatory bombing in the Gaza Strip and has sealed off the densely populated coastal strip.

The United Nations has spoken of a catastrophic humanitarian crisis in Gaza.