The World Health Organisation has strongly criticised Israel’s orders to evacuate 22 hospitals in northern Gaza, saying it is “a death sentence for the sick and injured.”
The WHO posted a statement on its official X handle on Saturday, expressing its condemnation.
The statement said, “The World Health Organisation, as the UN agency for public health, strongly criticises Israel’s repeated orders to evacuate 22 hospitals that are treating more than 2000 inpatients in northern Gaza. The evacuation of patients and health workers will make the current humanitarian and public health crisis even worse.
“Many patients who are critically ill and fragile are at risk of losing their lives: those who need intensive care or life support; patients who have hemodialysis; newborns in incubators; women with pregnancy complications, and others all face possible worsening of their condition or death if they are moved and lose access to life-saving medical care while being evacuated.”
The statement also mentioned that health facilities in northern Gaza keep receiving injured patients and are operating beyond their limits as some patients are being treated in hallways and outside in nearby streets due to a lack of hospital beds.
It continued, “Moving more than 2000 patients to southern Gaza, where health facilities are already full and cannot take more patients, could be the same as a death sentence.
“Hospital managers and health workers now have a terrible choice: leave critically ill patients amid a bombing campaign, risk their own lives while staying on-site to treat patients, or endanger their patients’ lives while trying to transport them to facilities that have no space for them.”
WHO urges Israel to cancel evacuation orders to hospitals in northern Gaza and calls for protecting health facilities, health workers, patients, and civilians.
