Gaza _ Palestine News Network
UN humanitarian coordinator Jimmy Mcgoldrake on Wednesday called for an urgent supply of fuel for vital health facilities and water and sanitation facilities in the Gaza Strip.
In a press release, McGoldrick said all funds earmarked for emergency fuel for 2018 had been implemented. The last amount of fuel will expire this week, he said.
He called on donor countries to provide the necessary quantities of fuel or money to buy them in order to save the lives of patients by ensuring that generators operating in reserve are operated with power outages.
They needed financial support amounting to $4.5 million to provide for the needs of Gaza´s vital facilities and to maintain basic services until the end of the current year.
"If new funds are not received immediately, we will face a catastrophic collapse in the delivery of basic services," he said. Services provided in hospitals and clinics, as well as sewage treatment, water and sanitation facilities will stop, and some hospitals will already stop within a week ".
He noted that some large important hospitals have only two weeks of fuel.
If the crisis persists, 300,000 people will face serious health risks due to sewage flowing into the streets, he said. He pointed out that the basic infrastructure was seriously damaged by fuel shortages.
The situation in Gaza was desperate, he said, calling for the need to work to prevent further slippage into a disaster in basic services. He stressed the need for the international community to provide immediate support to the population in Gaza.
The Ministry of Health in Gaza has said that the fuel crisis has entered the most difficult phase and that the coming days are crucial for the continuation of the work of hospitals and health centers in the absence of any reassurances from the concerned authorities to surround the crisis that threatens the medical complex al-Shifa and Nasser Medical complex in three weeks, and the Najar hospital Within two weeks and Beit Hanoun hospital within 10 days to come.
