WHO chief calls for protection of health teams ahead of polio vaccination rollout
World Health Organization director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said polio vaccination teams in Gaza must be “protected and allowed to conduct the upcoming campaign in Gaza safely”.
“We urge all parties to ensure their protection, and that of health facilities and children,” Tedros said in a post on social media, ahead of the first day of the campaign on Sunday.
The WHO chief made his call in a week that saw four security staff with an aid convoy killed in an Israeli air strike and a vehicle with the UN’s World Food Programme sprayed with Israeli bullets near a checkpoint.
The US-based director of American Near East Refugee Aid (Anera) told Al Jazeera earlier today that Israeli forces gave no prior warning or had any communication with his organisation’s aid convoy before striking the lead vehicle in the convoy and killing the four Palestinians on Thursday.
The #polio vaccination teams must be protected and allowed to conduct the upcoming campaigns in #Gaza safely. We urge all parties to ensure their protection, and that of health facilities and children.
Humanitarian pauses are welcome, but ultimately, the only solution to… pic.twitter.com/B8ftmJn22A
— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) August 30, 2024
In numbers: The plan to vaccinate 640,000 children in Gaza against polio
- 640,000 children under age 10 need to be vaccinated.
- 1.26 million doses have been delivered to Gaza, so children can receive the required two doses, four weeks apart.
- 2,700 health workers will help administer the vaccines in the plan coordinated by Gaza’s Ministry of Health together with the WHO, UNICEF, UNRWA and others.
- 3 days – the initial length of a “humanitarian pause”, from 6am to 3pm, to allow the vaccination plan rollout, although WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus says only a ceasefire will protect the health of Gaza’s children.
- 99 percent – Gaza’s vaccination rate against polio before the war.
- 25 years – how long Gaza went without any cases of polio.
- 10 months – the age of Abdel-Rahman, the Palestinian baby who is now partially paralysed from polio.
Humanitarian pauses for polio vaccinations a ‘very positive sign’
We can see more preparations by Gaza’s Health Ministry and coordination with UNICEF, UNRWA and WHO in Deir el-Balah, which is the first place where the vaccination campaign will begin.
We can see that UN-affiliated evacuation centres are being equipped with the essential medical supplies to start the vaccination process tomorrow. We know the vaccinations will occur in primary healthcare centres and a few hospitals.
The vaccination will be two drops of oral vaccination and will take place in three phases. The first one will start in the central area for three days, the second in Khan Younis and the southern part, and the third in the north of the Strip.
Palestinians see this kind of agreement that Israel and Hamas have been reaching in terms of some sort of humanitarian pauses as a very positive sign that some sort of ceasefire can be prepared.
