Text size
A polio vaccination campaign began in Gaza on Saturday after the war-torn territory reported its first case of the disease in a quarter of a century, a health official said.
Local health officials, along with the United Nations and non-governmental organizations, are “launching a polio vaccination campaign in the central area today,” Moussa Abed, director of primary health care at Gaza’s health ministry, told AFP.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday that Israel had agreed to a series of three-day “humanitarian pauses” in Gaza to facilitate vaccinations, although officials had previously said the campaign would begin on Sunday.
After starting in central Gaza, the vaccines will be administered in southern Gaza and then in northern Gaza.
The campaign, which includes two batches, aims to cover more than 640,000 children under the age of 10.
Michael Ryan, the WHO’s deputy director-general, told the UN Security Council this week that 1.26 million doses of the oral vaccine had been delivered to Gaza and another 400,000 were yet to arrive.
The Ramallah-based Palestinian Ministry of Health said earlier this month that tests in Jordan had confirmed polio in an unvaccinated 10-month-old baby from central Gaza.
The poliovirus is highly infectious and is most commonly spread through sewage and contaminated water – an increasing problem in Gaza as the war between Israel and Hamas drags on.
The disease mainly affects children under the age of five. It can cause deformities and paralysis and is potentially fatal.
Bakr Deeb told AFP on Saturday that he had brought his three children – all under the age of 10 – for the vaccination, despite initial doubts about its safety.
“At first I was hesitant and very worried about the safety of this vaccination,” he said.
“After being assured of his safety and with all the families who went to the vaccination sites, I decided to go with my children to protect them.”
Abed, the health official, stressed on Saturday that the vaccine is “100% safe”.
The war in Gaza was triggered by an unprecedented attack by Hamas on southern Israel on October 7, which resulted in the deaths of 1,199 people, mostly civilians, according to AFP statistics based on Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory military campaign has killed at least 40,691 people in Gaza, the country’s health ministry said. The UN rights office says most of the dead are women and children.
Incessant Israeli bombardment has also caused a major humanitarian crisis and devastated the health system.
bur-rcb/dv