What happens when you don’t eat for days?
Ashraf Abou El-Ezz, a US-based physician with the advocacy group Doctors Against Genocide, warns that lack of food can be especially deadly for children.
Abou El-Ezz said if aid and medical supplies do not enter Gaza promptly, the Israeli-imposed hunger crisis may lead to mass casualties.
He said that with starvation, the body starts to use nutrients stored in the liver. “Once you start depleting this, you start going into electrolyte imbalances as well as organ failures, and you end up dying,” Abou El-Ezz told Al Jazeera. “And children are the most vulnerable group of patients that can be affected.”
The doctor said the hasty re-introduction of food into starved people’s systems without health supervision can also lead to health complications.
“I think the Israelis know that well, and that’s why they are trying to starve them.”
‘Tip of the iceberg’: Starvation deaths increasing in Gaza
Al Jazeera’s Hani Mahmoud says starvation deaths in Gaza are increasing at a “frightening pace”.
“This is the tip of the iceberg,” Mahmoud reported from Gaza City, noting that people of all ages, including children and the elderly, have been transferred to hospitals due to malnutrition.
He added that the now-infamous US- and Israeli-backed GHF aid distribution scheme has exacerbated the crisis.
As we’ve been reporting, hundreds of Palestinians have been killed while seeking aid since the GHF began operating in Gaza in May.
“People are trying to [buy] whatever they can get their hands on” to survive, Mahmoud said.
WHO chief says 2.1 million people face starvation in Gaza
The director-general of the World Health Organization has warned that more than two million people in Gaza are facing starvation, as deaths from malnutrition surge.
His comments come as Israel continues to prevent aid supplies, including baby formula, from reaching the enclave.
