Let’s go, the fear of polio has spread… “We can’t get the vaccine in the war zone”[사람, 세계]

11 month old baby suddenly can’t crawl
Missing the vaccination period due to collapse of medical system
WHO: “Highly contagious, hundreds of people appear to be infected”

11-month-old Abdelrahman Abu Al-Jedian sleeps in a car seat in a tent in the central Gaza Strip on the 27th. Abdelrahman suffered from polio, which left his left leg permanently paralyzed. Deir al-Bala = AP Newsis

“My youngest child, who was 11 months old, suddenly stopped crawling.”

Palestinian Gaza residents Abu Al-Jedian and his wife Nebine fled their home in Beit Rahiyya, northern Gaza, in October last year when war broke out between Israel and Hamas, which rules Gaza. They struggled to raise their eight children while moving from shelter to shelter.

The couple temporarily forgot the hardships of their refugee life through their children. In particular, the youngest child, Abdelrahman, who was born in September of the same year, just before the outbreak of the war, was the couple’s treasure. He smiled easily and grew faster than his older brothers and sisters, so he monopolized the love of the entire family.

Abdelrahman, who contracted polio last month, will now be permanently unable to use his left leg. He was born during the war and never received any vaccinations, including polio. There is no cure for polio once symptoms appear.

Abdelrahman now spends all day lying in a basket-shaped newborn car seat. It is cramped for a newborn who will soon be turning one. The parents are heartbroken because they cannot get their son vaccinated due to the war and cannot afford proper childcare supplies.

“There is no treatment or rehabilitation available in the Gaza Strip right now,” Mr. Nebine said in a bewildered voice on the 27th, according to the Associated Press. If the war had not broken out and he had been vaccinated, Abdelrahman would soon be walking like other babies his age, but we will never see that again.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), polio vaccinations were carried out in Gaza without major disruption before the war broke out. Health experts have been concerned that the prolonged war would lead to a virtual collapse of Gaza’s health system, leading to outbreaks of preventable diseases such as polio. Abdelrahman’s case has made these fears a reality.

The WHO expressed concern that “poliovirus spreads through contaminated water such as sewage. It is also highly contagious.” It estimated that hundreds of children are infected with polio, although they do not have symptoms yet. At least two babies have already shown symptoms of polio, the Associated Press reported.

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) decided to resume polio vaccinations for children in Gaza starting on the 31st. However, there are growing concerns about whether the vaccinations will proceed smoothly as ceasefire negotiations between Hamas and Israel are still far away.

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2024-08-29 14:26:37