When girls complain to pediatrician Lobna al-Azaiza in the Gaza Strip that they do not have a comb, she tells them to cut their hair.
It’s not just combs. Israel’s blockade of the area devastated by ten months of war means there is little to no shampoo, soap, period products and household cleaning supplies.
Garbage collection and sewage treatment have also collapsed, and it is easy to see why contagious diseases such as scabies or fungal infections, which spread in overcrowded houses and a lack of cleanliness, are on the rise.
“In recent times, rashes and skin diseases have been the most common illnesses we have observed. They have many causes, including overcrowding in the camps, increasing heat in the tents, sweating among children and lack of sufficient water for bathing,” the doctor said.
Azaiza worked at Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia until Israeli tanks separated the north of the besieged enclave from the south.
Like most medical professionals in Gaza, she has adapted and continues to treat patients. On her way to work, she passes her own destroyed house, destroyed in an Israeli attack.
The tent clinic she set up with a small team initially began treating children, but has now, out of necessity, become a practice for entire families, most of whom – like the vast majority of the 2.3 million people in the Gaza Strip – have also been displaced from their homes or bombed.
Even the available medicines are often unaffordable; a tube of simple burn ointment can now cost 200 shekels ($53).
International aid flows have fallen dramatically since Israel took control of the Rafah border crossing from Egypt, exacerbating the humanitarian crisis.
Israel denies responsibility for delays in delivering urgently needed humanitarian aid, saying the UN and others are responsible for distribution within the enclave.
Azaiza has little doubt where the immediate solution lies:
“The border crossing must be opened so that we can import medicines, because most of the current medicines are ineffective: zero effect, there is no effect on the skin diseases that we see.”
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