Hospitals in Gaza are facing a critical crisis as severe fuel shortages force doctors to operate in darkness, jeopardizing the lives of countless patients.
With power outages crippling medical facilities, the already dire situation is worsening, raising urgent concerns over the healthcare system’s capacity to cope amid ongoing conflict.
Fuel shortages are widespread in the besieged territory after more than 10 months of war, further restricting services at those hospitals that are still open.
One of the patients receiving treatment at Gaza, Ayman Zaqout had a hard time even reaching the Kamal Adwan, located in Beit Lahia, because of Israeli intensive strikes and evacuation orders.
When admitted, he discovered he would be treated mostly in the dark.
“There was no electricity and I don’t know how they will be able to treat me in these circumstances,” he told AFPTV this week, grimacing from pain as he battled renal colic.He was lucky to be treated at all.
Not long after he arrived, the hospital “stopped taking in patients” altogether, doctor Mahmoud Abu Amsha said, noting that “international organisations no longer supply it with the fuel needed for the generators”.
The fuel shortages could soon prove deadly, Abu Amsha said.
“Children in the incubators are threatened with cardiac arrest and death, and there are also seven cases in the intensive care unit, and they will die due to the fuel shortage,” he said.
The lack of fuel also makes it difficult to operate ambulances.
Al-Awda Hospital, also in northern Gaza, is desperately waiting for a fuel delivery to restart its generators, the hospital’s acting director, Mohammed Salha, told AFP.
“Two days ago, we closed some services and postponed operations. This puts the sick and wounded at risk,” Salha said.
Since then, the hospital has been providing “the minimum service” only thanks to other hospitals that “donated part of their fuel stock”, he said.
