Alice Cuddy
Reporting from Jerusalem
I’ve been speaking over WhatsApp to a doctor at the first UK-funded field hospital in Gaza.
The medical coordinator for the British aid organisation UK-Med tells me that over the past few days there have been “an increase in the number of explosive injuries” at the field hospital in al-Mawasi, in the south of Gaza.
“Our orthopaedic surgeons have been operating on fractures and shrapnel injuries, and some people have had injuries resulting in limb amputation. Unfortunately in mass casualty events we have received people, including children, who died from their injuries before arriving at our field hospital,” she says.
The doctor adds that three babies were delivered at the facility yesterday - two by emergency C-section.
“Today our paediatric ward is filled mainly with children recovering from surgery, but also some with respiratory infections as a result of living in overcrowded conditions in tents. Lack of access to clean water and soap mean that we see a lot of children with skin abscesses that require surgery to drain the infection,” she says.
Tomorrow, the field hospital will run an outpatient clinic aimed at treating children and breastfeeding women suffering from malnutrition.