'An Entire Generation Is at Risk': Aid Agencies Warn of Mass Polio Outbreak in Gaza

Dozens of humanitarian aid groups and medical professionals warned Tuesday that Gaza could soon face a mass polio outbreak that would endanger children across the enclave and the region if Israel does not immediately stop its bombardment and siege of the Palestinian territory.

"Without immediate action, an entire generation is at risk of infection, and hundreds of children face paralysis by a highly communicable disease that can be prevented with a simple vaccine," said Jeremy Stoner of Save the Children, part of a coalition of aid organizations and physicians that demanded "an immediate and sustained cease-fire to allow polio vaccinations to take place in Gaza."

"For a polio vaccination campaign to be effective, it must be able to reach at least 95% of targeted children, and this cannot happen in an active war zone," the coalition said. "Any cease-fire or pause requested by the U.N. must be used to facilitate full humanitarian access, not just for vaccines but for the full range of assistance needed to sustain civilians' basic needs. All parties to conflict have an obligation to facilitate humanitarian access at all times, regardless of whether conflict is active or not."

The groups' call came days after Gaza health officials found the enclave's first polio case in more than two decades after testing a 10-month-old child in Deir al-Balah—one of the cities in which Gaza's health ministry and the World Health Organization detected poliovirus in wastewater last month.

Much of Gaza's population currently lives in makeshift tents surrounded by rotting garbage and other waste, unsanitary conditions that heighten the risk of infectious disease outbreaks. Israel's relentless U.S.-backed bombardment of Gaza has decimated the territory's waste-removal infrastructure and healthcare system, laying the groundwork for a public health catastrophe.

Nahed Abu Iyada, the health program field officer at CARE West Bank and Gaza, said Tuesday that "without an immediate cease-fire and access to vaccines and humanitarian aid across the Strip, the people of Gaza are facing a public health disaster that will spread and endanger children across the region and beyond."

But the prospects of an imminent cease-fire agreement appeared remote Tuesday as Hamas accused the Biden administration of "buying time for Israel to continue its genocide" by pushing for a deal that grants some of far-right Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's major demands.

The New York Times reported that "under the new U.S. proposal, Israeli troops would be able to continue to patrol part of the Gazan border with Egypt, albeit in reduced numbers—one of Mr. Netanyahu's core demands."

Hamas has said that "any agreement must guarantee the cessation of aggression against our people, withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, provision of urgent relief in the form of food and medicine, and reaching a real deal to exchange prisoners."