Lancet Comment Calls for “Humanitarian Corridor” to Allow Treatment for Critically Ill Patients in Gaza
Lancet Comment Calls for “Humanitarian Corridor” to Allow Treatment for Critically Ill Patients in Gaza
The Lancet Global Health comment by Ruth Gibson and colleagues calls for reopening the “humanitarian corridor” connecting the Gaza Strip to other Palestinian hospitals for critically ill patients—especially children—who cannot receive proper care in Gaza.
The Lancet Global Health comment calls for allowing the safe transit of patients needing lifesaving care from Gaza to the West Bank or East Jerusalem (the separated parts of Palestine) as well as allowing their return to Gaza following treatment. It comes at a time when the WHO reports that half of the hospitals in Gaza are destroyed, and those that remain are only partially functioning. According to the UN, 18,500 patients are awaiting medical evacuation for conditions that cannot be treated in Gaza, many of them children.
The commentary is co-written by Ruth Gibson, a visiting scholar at the Stanford Center for Innovation in Global Health (CIGH), two Israeli physicians and a humanitarian coordinator from Gaza, as well as California-based humanitarian surgeon Dr. Feroze Sidhwa and Stanford Law Professor Tom Dannenbaum.
“This is a beautiful example of people coming together across national and political divides, despite bombs falling, to save lives and uplift the right to health,” said Gibson, who is senior author of the commentary.
“Four thousand children, including cancer patients, children still suffering from malnutrition, children with inborn metabolic diseases and congenital malformations, and children with post traumatic injuries that need corrective surgeries can all be treated in the West Bank and East Jerusalem,” said first author Michal Feldon, an Israeli pediatrician, rheumatologist, and volunteer for Physicians for Human Rights Israel.