The threat of polio is rising quickly in the Gaza Strip, prompting aid groups to call for an urgent pause in the Israel-Hamas war so they can ramp up vaccinations and prevent a full-blown outbreak.
At least one case has been confirmed, others are suspected and the virus was detected in wastewater in six locations in July.
Polio was eradicated in Gaza 25 years ago, but vaccinations plunged after the war began 10 months ago and the territory has become a breeding ground for the virus, aid groups say.
Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are crowded into tent camps lacking clean water or proper disposal of sewage and rubbish.
To avert a widespread outbreak, aid groups are preparing to vaccinate more than 600,000 children in the coming weeks.
They say the ambitious vaccination plans are impossible, though, without a pause in the fighting between Israel and Hamas.
“We are anticipating and preparing for the worst-case scenario of a polio outbreak in the coming weeks or month,” Francis Hughes, the Gaza response director at Care International, told the Associated Press.
The World Health Organisation and UNICEF, the United Nations children’s agency, said on Friday that pause of at least seven days was needed for a mass vaccination plan.
The UN aims to bring 1.6 million doses of polio vaccine into Gaza, where sanitation and water systems have been destroyed.
Polio, which is highly contagious and transmits mainly through contact with contaminated faeces, water or food, can cause difficulty breathing and irreversible paralysis, usually in the legs.
It strikes young children in particular and is sometimes fatal.
The aid group Mercy Corps estimates some 50,000 babies born since the war began have not been immunised against polio.
The World Health Organisation and UNICEF said on Friday that three children were suspected of being infected and their stool samples were being tested in Jordan.
The West Bank’s health ministry said tests in Jordan confirmed one case in a 10-month-old child.
It was not clear if this was one of the cases cited by the WHO.
Aid workers expect the number of suspected cases will rise and worry the disease could be hard to contain without urgent intervention.
Health workers in Gaza are gearing up for a mass vaccination campaign from the end of August and continue into September.
The goal is to immunise 640,000 children under 10 over two rounds of vaccinations.
The Israeli military said it was “preparing to support a comprehensive vaccination campaign”.
Hamas said it would support a seven-day truce for vaccinations.
Ceasefire talks resume in Cairo next week.
The polio alarm was first raised in July when the WHO said sewage samples in six locations in central and southern Gaza tested positive for a variant used in vaccines.
This weakened form of the virus can mutate into a stronger version and cause an outbreak in areas that lack proper immunisation, the WHO says.
Source Agencies
