Polio Vaccination Campaign in Gaza
In his statement to the Anadolu Agency (AA) correspondent, Musa Abid, General Director of Primary Care of the Ministry of Health in Gaza, stated that 443 thousand children under the age of 10 received the first dose of the polio vaccine, which corresponds to 69% of the children in Gaza. Abid stated that the vaccination process in the central part of the Gaza Strip was completed and they achieved better results than expected.
In this context, he stated that 195 thousand children were vacated in the Deyr al-Balah, Nusayrat, al-Burayj, al-Maghazi and al-Zavayide regions in the central part, and that this figure was above the initially targeted 160 thousand. He also stated that vaccination continues in the southern cities of Khan Yunus and Rafah and that 248 thousand children were vaccinated until yesterday evening, and this number is aimed to reach 300 thousand.
On the other hand, Abid also touched upon the difficulties posed by Israel. He stated that there were some coordination problems in vaccination in unsafe war zones in the east, which the Israeli army defined as “red spots”. He stated that after the coordination with the Israeli side, they managed to reach some of these regions, but they have been waiting for approval from Israel for 4 days to reach 7 points east of Khan Yunus and Rafah.
Abid added that the next phase of the vaccination campaign will start in the north of Gaza on Tuesday. The vaccination campaign against polio in Gaza gained momentum when the first polio case was detected in the region by the Palestinian Ministry of Health on August 16.
In collaboration with the World Health Organization (WHO), the Palestinian Ministry of Health, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNWRA), a comprehensive study covering more than 600 thousand children under the age of 10 is carried out in the Gaza Strip. The polio vaccination campaign was launched. Especially in the city of Khan Younis, where Israeli attacks continue, the polio vaccination campaign for children under the age of 10 started on the evening of August 31.
