Doctors in Gaza are looking forward to examining thousands of children for malnutrition
DEIR BALAH, Gaza Strip (Reuters) – Gaza medics said on Monday they were working to increase the rates of screening children for cases of acute malnutrition amid fears of widespread hunger as residents flee to new areas.
Muammar Saeed, a doctor at the International Medical Corps, a relief group, told Reuters by phone that the organization and its partners are looking to examine more than 200,000 children under five in a medical campaign to find cases and provide treatment.
He added, “With displacement, groups are settling in new locations without access to clean water or sufficient food. We fear that there will be more missing cases.”
At the beginning of this week, families flocked to a clinic affiliated with the International Medical Corps in the city of Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip. The authority opened the clinic after it said it was forced to close two centers in the town of Rafah in the south of the Strip due to a lack of security.
Raghda Ibrahim Qeshta, a nutrition official, told Reuters while she was carrying the child, Jana Ayyad, that the five-year-old girl weighed only nine kilograms when she arrived and was suffering from diarrhea and vomiting.
Nesma Ayad, Jana’s mother, said as she sat next to the bed, My daughter was dying in front of me… I didn’t know what to do. Paramedics noted that Jana began to gain some weight after receiving treatment, but she is still skinny, as is evident in her protruding ribs while she is lying down.
Paramedics can measure nutrition levels by measuring the circumference of the child’s arms. During a brief visit by a Reuters photographer, at least two measurements appeared in the yellow range, indicating a risk of malnutrition. Authority data suggest that the groups most vulnerable to malnutrition so far are infants and children under the age of two years.
A group of UN-led relief agencies say they estimate that about seven per cent of Gaza’s children may be suffering from acute malnutrition, compared to 0.8 per cent before the conflict between Israel and the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) began on October 7.
The worst cases of extreme hunger are concentrated in the north, where a UN-backed report warned of impending famine in March.
However, aid workers fear that malnutrition will spread to the central and southern areas of Gaza due to the Israeli military campaign in Rafah, which has displaced more than a million people and restricted the flow of supplies through the south of crossings.
Israel launched its military operation in Gaza after Hamas-led militants attacked Israeli towns on October 7, killing 1,200 people and taking about 250 hostages, according to Israeli statistics. Israel says it has strengthened its efforts to facilitate the flow of aid into Gaza and accuses international relief agencies of causing distribution problems within the Strip.
