Home west asia Guterres Calls For Evacuation of 2,500 Children From Gaza

Guterres Calls For Evacuation of 2,500 Children From Gaza

The doctors said they are advocating for a centralized process for medical evacuations with clear guidelines.

On Thursday, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for the immediate evacuation of 2,500 children from Gaza for medical treatment, following a meeting with U.S. doctors who warned that the children were at imminent risk of death in the coming weeks.

The four doctors had all volunteered in Gaza during the 15-month-long war between Israel and Palestinian militants Hamas that has devastated the enclave of more than 2 million people and its healthcare system.

Thousands Waiting For Evacuations

Just days before a ceasefire began on January 19, the World Health Organization said more than 12,000 patients were waiting for medical evacuations and it had hoped they could be ramped up during the truce.

Among those patients urgently needing treatment are 2,500 children, said Feroze Sidhwa, a California trauma surgeon who worked in Gaza from March 25 to April 8 last year.

โ€œThereโ€™s about 2,500 children who are at imminent risk of death in the next few weeks. Some are dying right now. Some will die tomorrow. Some will die the next day,โ€ Sidhwa told reporters after meeting with Guterres.

โ€œOf those 2,500 kids, the vast majority need very simple things done,โ€ he said, citing the case of a 3-year-old boy who suffered burns to his arm. The burns had healed, but the scar tissue was slowly cutting off blood flow, leaving him at risk of amputation, said Sidhwa.

Lack Of Aid

Ayesha Khan, an emergency doctor at Stanford University Hospital, worked in Gaza from the end of November until January 1. She spoke about many children with amputations, who had no prosthetics or rehabilitation.

She held up a photo of two young sisters with amputations, who were sharing a wheelchair. They were orphaned in the attack that injured them and Khan said: โ€œTheir only chance for survival is to be medically evacuated.โ€

โ€œUnfortunately, the current security restrictions donโ€™t allow for children to travel with more than one caregiver,โ€ she said. โ€œTheir caregiver is their aunt, who has a baby that she is breast-feeding.โ€


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โ€œSo even though we were able to, with great difficulty, get evacuation set up for them, they wonโ€™t let the aunt take her baby with her. So the aunt has to choose between the baby sheโ€™s breast-feeding and the lives of her two nieces.โ€

Centralized Process

The doctors said they are advocating for a centralized process for medical evacuations with clear guidelines.

โ€œUnder this ceasefire agreement, there is supposed to be a mechanism in place for medical evacuations. Weโ€™ve still not seen that process spelled out,โ€ said Thaer Ahmad, an emergency room doctor from Chicago, who worked in Gaza in January 2024.

Khan said there was no process in place to get the children out, adding: โ€œAnd will they be allowed to return? There is some discussion right now of the Rafah border opening only for exits, but itโ€™s exit without right to return.โ€

Guterres said he was โ€œdeeply movedโ€ by his meeting with the American doctors on Thursday.

โ€œ2,500 children must be immediately evacuated with the guarantee that they will be able to return to their families and communities,โ€ Guterres posted on X after the meeting.

COGAT, the Israeli defence agency that liaises with the Palestinians, did not respond to a request for comment on the demand for medical evacuation of 2,500 children by Guterres and the doctors he met with. Israelโ€™s mission to the U.N. also did not respond to a request for comment.

At the start of this month, before the ceasefire, the WHO said 5,383 patients had been evacuated with its support since the war began in October 2023, most of those in the first seven months before the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza was closed.

(With inputs from Reuters)