We can expect an unprecedented surge of COVID-19 in Gaza in the coming weeks and a severely damaged health care system and exhausted health care workers unable to cope adequately. Prior to the bombing, 99% of the COVID-19 virus circulating in Palestine was from the highly contagious British Variant B.1.1.7. An estimated 5% of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza had been vaccinated and mask use during Ramadan was lax. The positivity rate for coronavirus in Gaza was around 30% three weeks ago. Israel’s policy of vaccine apartheid and health care de-development had already devastated the Gazan health care system, with a lack of hospital beds, trained personnel, respirators, oxygen, and essential medications. Health care was also on life support following the injuries from the Great March of Return and then the most recent assault. Compounding this, the World Health Organization <https://www.bmj.com/rapid-responses> estimated that only 39% of patients from Gaza in need of high level health care or cancer care involving radiation were able to access medical appointments for hospitals in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. Add to that the fact that Dr. Ayman Abu Aouf, head of the internal medicine department and coronavirus response at Gaza’s largest hospital, al-Shifa, was killed as well as several other doctors and health workers. So we have a massive destruction of hospitals and clinics, severe limitations of food, hygiene, electricity, and water, hundreds injured, thousands displaced and crowded together without their basic human needs being met. This assault was clearly a super spreader event. https://mondoweiss.net/2021/05/the-super-spreader-assault-on-gaza/
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