The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) warns of the continued suffering of patients in the Gaza Strip, especially those with blood diseases and genetic disorders, amid the chronic shortage of their medicines that would inflict serious life-threatening implications to their health. As the Israeli aggression enters its seventh month, PCHR sends an urgent appeal to the international community and its humanitarian organizations to assume full responsibility after a number of deaths had been reported among patients who had not received their medications for several months due to the Israel strangulating siege on the Gaza Strip, particularly in Gaza city and northern Gaza, and not allowing the free passage of all consignments of medicine and medical material, in blatant violations of Articles (55) and (56) of the Fourth Geneva Convention.
PCHR emphasizes of serious indications that the Israeli Occupying Forces (IOF) insist on pushing hundreds of patients from the north to the south and thus forcibly displacing them at a time IOF struck a heavy blow to the already crippled healthcare system and destroyed the two major medical complexes in the Gaza Strip, Al-Shifa Hospital and Nasser Hospital. By this, patients’ hopes of receiving adequate medical services across the Gaza Strip have faded away, as part of Israel’s perpetuation of the crime of genocide by deliberately inflicting on the Strip’s population, including patients, conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part, in accordance with Article II of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
According to PCHR’s follow-ups, (305) patients with thalassemia, including 80 children, have suffered from lack of essential drug types, such as EXJADE and DESEFERAL, which are lifelong medications, and any lack threatens their lives. Doctors confirm that the symptoms and complications resulting from patients not taking these medications would delay their return to a stable health condition in short term. Lack of medicines would lead to hemochromatosis (iron overload in the body organs): if the pancreas stores too much iron, it will cause diabetes, while in the liver, it causes cirrhosis, adding that one of the main causes of death among thalassemia patients is too much iron stored in the heart. Since the beginning of the Israeli aggression on the Gaza Strip, (18) thalassemia patients died, while about (10) patients are facing imminent death after their health condition deteriorated.1 Moreover, most of these patients have sought shelter in hospitals to be near the follow-up clinics, and with hospitals under the Israeli attacks, two patients were killed, while the rest of the patients are left to face imminent death due to the acute shortage of drugs and medical supplies, especially for (63) patients who remained in Gaza City and northern Gaza Strip.2
In his testimony to PCHR’s field researcher, 31-year-old patient, Hussein Na’eem Kreizm, from Jabalia in the northern Gaza Strip, said he has become unable to move triggered by the severe health complications which appeared after not taking his iron chelators for so long because they are not available in the northern Gaza Strip due to the Israeli-imposed siege. Moreover, he can hardly get blood transfusions due to non-functional laboratories at the northern Gaza’s hospital.
Kreizem’s story sets an explicit example for what patients suffer in Gaza City and northern Gaza. He said,
“With the beginning of the Israeli aggression, we could not reach the specialized center at the Turkish-Palestinian Friendship Hospital due to scarce transportation, so I headed to Al-Shifa Hospital along with other patients to obtain blood units that we could hardly get due to the heavy pressure on the hospital that was overwhelmed with causalities. Moreover, we received those blood transfusions without ensuring lack of viruses in blood and going through a filtration process, thus increasing the risk of infection transmission. Throughout the Israeli aggression, I could not see any hematologist to prescribe the dozes of medicine and follow up my condition. Also, EXJADE tablets and DESFERAL Intravenous Administration are not available now as they were only dispended by the Ministry of Health and not available at pharmacies. As a result of not receiving any drug since October 2023, I have suffered from severe complications that made me lose my ability to move. I try to drink a lot of tea to reduce my drug withdrawal risk but it is not sufficient. I feel like we are being left to die silently and slowly amid lack of essentials drugs for thalassemia patients.”
Furthermore, about 105 patients also suffer from Hemophilia, an inherited blood clotting (coagulation) disorder caused by inactive or deficient blood proteins and primarily affecting male. People with hemophilia bleed for a longer time after an injury than any normal person, so they need lifelong medications particularly “FACTOR8-FACTOR9”. Since the very beginning of the aggression, hemophilia patients have endured many challenges, including the shortage of these medicines that leads to organ and tissue damage and lack of medical personnel to follow-up their conditions after 2 out of 5 doctors specialized in genetic blood disorders travelled abroad. These patients are considered the most affected if injured due to the ongoing military aggression. Thus, they are facing imminent death amid difficult access to their medicines, including painkillers.
The ongoing Israeli aggression has collected the lives of 23 patients out of the total number (360) of patients with cystic fibrosis, a genetic disorder that damages the lungs, digestive tract and other organs. These patients need a lot of lifelong drugs and treatments to cope with this disease, such as Creon and Gentoycin, types of therapeutic milk formulas, and vitamins, so shortage of any type of them would endanger their lives. Many of those patients in critical condition had to evacuate from northern Gaza to the south to follow up in the hospitals there, which even have not provided them any medical services due to these hospitals’ catastrophic conditions. Therefore, it was decided to refer around (20) patients in critical condition for treatment abroad, and so far, only (6) patients managed to get outside Gaza.3 Among those patients was Malak Jamal Hassan (22), whose condition worsened due to the lack of drugs and the difficult conditions imposed by the Israeli aggression on Gaza Strip patients and so was referred to Egypt to receive adequate treatment. Meanwhile, Malak’s sister, Alaa Gamal Hassan (24), died from cystic fibrosis. According to their father, Jamal Saadat Hassan (52), his two daughters have lived with their disease by sticking to their treatment protocol despite having difficulty to access their medicines before the war. However, after they stopped taking their drugs, their condition worsened over the past months.
The father told PCHR’s field researcher, “I could not obtain medicines for my daughters due to being unable to reach the specialized healthcare facilities. We have endured many challenges after evacuating to Nuseirat refugee camp, and my daughters could not use the nebulizer because of the constant power outage, in addition to lack of essential vitamins and supplements. Things got worse after a nearby building was bombed on 31 October 2023. My daughters inhaled dust, dirt, and the smell of gunpowder that badly affected their health condition and developed serious symptoms, such as suffocation, yellow eyes, swollen abdomen, and stomachache, accompanied by chest pain, and generalized muscle weakness that made them unable to move. We went to the European Hospital for medical follow-up, but due to lack of specialized medical personnel after many doctors travelled has deprived them of receiving adequate treatment. Immediately, we initiated the medical referral procedures for them to receive treatment abroad, but Alaa’s condition deteriorated and she died on 09 January 2024. Meanwhile, due to the slow patient referral mechanism, Malak could only travel on 09 April 2024.”
In light of the above, PCHR reiterates its call on the international community to exert pressure on Israel to end its military aggression and siege on the Gaza Strip, and calls on the High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention to endeavor to end Israel’s violations of the right to health as Israel, as an occupying power, has the primary responsibility to ensure respect, protection and fulfilment of the right to health of Palestinians in Gaza to the full extent of their actual control.4 Also, PCHR believes that all international organizations, with the World Health Organization (WHO) on top, have the duty to act promptly to save the lives of Gaza Strip patients, especially those with genetic and blood disorders, by integrating their drugs within lists of the essential drugs allowed entry into the Gaza Strip, especially healthcare centers in Gaza City and northern Gaza. PCHR stresses that all patients must enjoy their right to receive adequate treatment, and therefore calls on all concerned parties to provide the capabilities necessary for the blood laboratories’ functioning, especially blood filters, to ensure safe blood transfusions to these patients.
Trial Version
