Patients are having surgery without anaesthetic in Gaza because supplies are so low, the WHO said last week, announcing that its own warehouse of medicine in the strip was now empty.
Doctors are making “impossible choices” as medical supplies run out amid a total siege imposed by Israel, with “critical shortages” of items including morphine, saline solution and surgical supplies, which the WHO says will run out “in days”.
Local and general anaesthetics are “on the brink of running out completely”, while blood banks only have two weeks of supply left, said WHO officials.
Medicines for blood pressure and diabetes, seizure medications, and drugs needed for dialysis and for heart disease are also critically low, reports The Independent.
Dr Richard Peeperkorn, a WHO representative, said: “We have no supplies or equipment left in (our) Gaza warehouse. Health workers are having to make impossible choices to ration what little they have left, including operating without anaesthetics.”
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