Gaza’s collapsing health system shows struggles of medical care in war

The Gaza Strip’s health-care system stands on the brink of collapse as bombings damage hospitals and ambulances and as generators run out of fuel, highlighting how quality medical care is a casualty of war.

Dire scenarios await Gaza’s medical professionals. They face dwindling basic resources such as power, water and anesthesia, compelling doctors to confront wrenching decisions on whose lives to save. The growing humanitarian crisis is plunging health-care workers into the critical emergency planning that follows both human-made and natural disasters — assessing staffing and other resources, managing existing health needs on top of gruesome new ones, and looking out for their own welfare.

“When we are in a disaster setting or conflict, we usually have more patients than resources. We have to be very creative to be able to provide the best care for the most number of people,” said Lindsey Ryan Martin, who is director of global disaster response and humanitarian action at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and has been monitoring the situation in Gaza.

The health-care crisis extends beyond Tuesday’s deadly blast at al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City. Aid organizations say the war continues to imperil an already beleaguered health-care system.

Gaza’s Health Ministry said five hospitals were out of service as of Thursday and an additional 14 health facilities have closed because they lack fuel and electricity.

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Source: The Washington Post, 19 October 2023