The World Health Organization’s warning (WHO) follows the finding that more than four in five children “not eating for a whole day at least once every three days” prior to a food insecurity assessment.
Hunger snapshot
“These are children under the age of five who go without food all day,” said WHO spokesperson Dr. Margaret Harris. “So you ask, ‘Are the supplies coming through?’ No, children are starving.”
Additional worrying data from the Food Insecurity Snapshot Survey indicated that almost all young people surveyed in Gaza now eat only two different food groups per day. when the WHO recommendation is at least five.
According to a update this week from the UN Aid Coordination Office, OCHASince mid-January, more than 93,400 children under the age of five have been screened for malnutrition in Gaza; Acute malnutrition was diagnosed in 7,280 persons, including 5,604 with moderate acute malnutrition and 1,676 with severe acute malnutrition.
Preventable horrors
Following these concerns, OCHA highlighted the risk of fatal malnutrition and famine among Gaza’s most vulnerable individuals.
“I would say they certainly are not getting the amount they so desperately need to avoid a famine, to prevent all kinds of horrors that we see. Very little is happening at the moment,” says OCHA spokesperson Jens Laerke.
In response to questions about obstacles to accessing aid, he reiterated that the Israeli authorities’ obligations under international humanitarian law to facilitate the delivery of aid “do not stop at the border. It doesn’t end when you drop off just a few meters across the border and then drive away, leaving it to humanitarian workers to drive through active combat zones – which they can’t do – to pick it up. So to answer your question: no, the help that comes in does not reach the people.”
Amid continued reports of deadly Israeli bombing of Gaza on Friday, humanitarians continued to emphasize that land crossings for aid convoys would continue. “the only way to get (aid) in at scale and at speed… We need more of these land crossings and we need them open and we need them safe to pick up the aid when it is cordoned off” , said the OCHA spokesperson.
Floating dock setback
Asked about the US military-built floating dock moored off the coast of Gaza, which has reportedly been partially broken up on the high seas, Mr Laerke noted that “all ways of bringing in aid are welcome, so if that reality doesn’t work then of course that’s bad news… It was never realistic to be a big or the main pipeline of aid. It could have been an addition, and we will continue to emphasize that.”
As part of its ongoing efforts to prevent life-threatening hunger in Gaza, the WHO reported that it continues to work with partners and the local health authority to provide stabilization services to children suffering from the most life-threatening form of malnutrition.
To date, 68 children have received treatment, but due to the recent escalation of hostilities, the Nutrition Stabilization Center at Kamal Adwan Hospital in northern Gaza is out of service.
Since May 1, the UN World Food Program (WFP) and partners reported reaching approximately 60,000 children under the age of five and 22,820 pregnant and lactating women with 15-day nutritional supplements to help prevent malnutrition.