US health workers sound alarm on Gaza: 'Beyond anything seen before'

By Al Mayadeen English
Source: Agencies
27 Jun 2024 08:44
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Due to a dire shortage of bandages and the slim chance of his survival, US doctors in Gaza have made the agonizing choice to cease efforts to save a seven-year-old boy with extensive burns.

Palestinian men transferring a child to hospital after being injured during an Israeli airstrike on a residential building in Gaza. (AFP)

Patients in Gaza's remaining hospitals are succumbing to infections due to the scarcity of protective gear and soap, even if they manage to survive severe blast injuries.

Health workers are confronted with heart-wrenching decisions, such as abandoning efforts to save a seven-year-old boy with extensive burns because of a shortage of bandages and the likelihood that he wouldn't survive.

'Most of our patients were children under the age of 14'

These are among the distressing scenes witnessed by US doctors and nurses who have recently returned from the besieged Palestinian territory. They are now dedicated to raising awareness about the crisis and pressuring "Israel" to permit more life-saving supplies into Gaza.

"Whether or not a ceasefire happens, we have to get humanitarian aid. And we have to get it in sufficient volumes to meet the demands," Adam Hamawy, a former US Army combat surgeon, said as quoted by AFP in an interview after a medical mission to Gaza's European Hospital last month.

"You could give all you want, you can donate," added the reconstructive plastic surgeon from New Jersey. "But if these borders don't open up to allow that aid to get in, then it's just useless."

For the past 30 years, Hamawy has volunteered in regions ravaged by war and natural disasters, including the siege of Sarajevo and the earthquake in Haiti.

"But the level of civilian casualties that I experienced was beyond anything I'd seen before," stressed the 54-year-old.

"Most of our patients were children under the age of 14," he emphasized. "This has nothing to do with your political views."

Heart-wrenching decisions

Hamawy and other medical professionals said as quoted by AFP that they believe their efforts are currently best focused on lobbying political leaders to stop the war and pressuring "Israel" to comply with international law by allowing more aid into Gaza.

On a hot June afternoon in Washington, Monica Johnston, a 44-year-old ICU nurse from Portland, Oregon, shared that she had provided detailed lists of needed supplies during her meetings with White House officials and lawmakers on Capitol Hill. Unlike Hamawy, this was Johnston's first medical mission to Gaza.

"I don't watch the news, I don't take part in anything political," she said. But last fall, she received an email from the American Burn Association with an urgent call for help. "Anytime I hear the word 'help,' my ears perk up, my heart starts pumping, and I feel I need to do that."

A 19-member team organized by the Palestinian American Medical Association departed with packed suitcases, saying goodbye to their families. Once there, they encountered immense challenges: a shortage of health workers and a critical lack of essential medicines and basic hygiene supplies, resulting in widespread infections. Johnston's voice quivers with emotion as she recounts the heart-wrenching decision to stop treating a seven-year-old boy's severe burns to conserve resources for patients with higher chances of survival.

"Two days later, he started developing maggots in his wounds, and then the feeling of responsibility that I caused this," she said.

He was laid to rest in his bandages because his body was completely overrun by infection.

'Israel' kills 30 members of one family

Ammar Ghanem, a 54-year-old ICU doctor from Michigan, explained that whole families often arrived together because extended relatives commonly live in multistory buildings, making them more susceptible to bombings.

One such example was a cheerful 12-year-old boy who volunteered at the hospital and inspired the medics. However, he stopped coming for several days. When he returned, Ghanem learned the devastating news that thirty members of the boy's extended family had been killed in a single bombing, and the boy had helped retrieve their bodies from the rubble.

Initially, the team felt relatively safe, but this changed abruptly after the Rafah crossing was closed. This closure caused deep anxiety among their Palestinian colleagues, who experienced a sense of déjà vu from previous Israeli incursions into northern Gaza and the multiple evacuations they had endured.

Scheduled for a two-week mission, they found themselves stranded for several days because of the Israeli ongoing bombardment and total blockade. Now returned, they constantly think about the patients and colleagues they left behind in Gaza.

"What makes me feel better is feeling that I'm making a difference by relaying this message and telling people what I witnessed -- I think that's as important as what we did over there," says Hamawy.