WHO, St.

Earlier today, a joint UN humanitarian assessment team led by WHO accessed Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza to assess the situation on the ground, conduct a rapid situational analysis, assess medical priorities and establish logistics options for further missions. The team included public health experts, logistics officers and security staff from OCHA, UNDSS, UNMAS/UNOPS, UNRWA and WHO. 
 

A second WHO-led joint UN mission, working in collaboration with the Palestine Red Crescent Society, earlier today evacuated 31 babies from Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza, to a hospital in southern Gaza. The severely ill babies were transported in 6 ambulances supplied and staffed by the Palestine Red Crescent.  Other mission members included UN Mine Action, UNICEF and UNRWA. The mission was once again assessed as high-risk, due to the active combat taking place in close proximity to the hospital. 

With heavy hearts, WHO announces the death of one of our staff in Gaza, in the occupied Palestinian territory. Dima Abdullatif Mohammed Alhaj, 29 years old, had been with WHO since December 2019. She worked as a patient administrator at the Limb Reconstruction Centre, a critical part of the WHO Trauma and Emergency Team.
 

In a special session held today in Geneva, WHO’s Executive Board adopted a resolution aimed at addressing the catastrophic humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip. The resolution was adopted by consensus.
 

This is the first time since 7 October that a resolution on this conflict has been adopted by consensus within the UN system. It underscores the importance of health as a universal priority, in all circumstances, and the role of healthcare and humanitarianism in building bridges to peace, even in the most difficult of situations.
 

WHO reiterates its call for the protection of health care and humanitarian assistance in Gaza, following military checkpoint delays and detention of health partners during a mission to transfer critically-ill patients and deliver supplies to a hospital in northern Gaza. During the mission, a patient reportedly died.

WHO staff participated in a joint UN mission to Al-Shifa Hospital in north Gaza on 16 December to deliver health supplies and assess the situation in the facility. Partners on today’s mission included OCHA, UNDSS, and UNMAS. The team delivered medicines and surgical supplies, orthopedic surgery equipment, and anesthesia materials and drugs to the hospital.  
 

WHO and partners completed another high-risk mission on Monday to resupply fuel to the Al-Shifa Hospital in northern Gaza, where hundreds of thousands of people remain cut off from aid. Across the Gaza Strip, the few remaining hospitals find themselves in ever more dire circumstances, with hostilities often preventing access for patients and supplies, and health workers managing on little rest and scarce supplies.

As the risk of famine grows, and more people are e

World Health Organization teams have undertaken high-risk missions to deliver supplies, with partners, to hospitals in Northern and Southern Gaza witnessing intense hostilities in their vicinity, high patient loads and overcrowding caused by people displaced by the conflict seeking refuge.