A sharp rise in coronavirus infections in the Gaza Strip could overwhelm the Palestinian enclave’s meager medical system by next week, public health advisers said on Sunday.
Gaza, where the dense and poor population of 2 million is vulnerable to contagions, has logged 14,000 coronavirus cases and 65 deaths, mostly since August.
Seventy-nine of Gaza’s 100 ventilators have been taken up by COVID-19 patients, said Abdelraouf Elmanama, a microbiologist who is part of the enclave’s pandemic task force, Reuters reported.
“In 10 days the health system will become unable to absorb such a hike in cases and there might be cases that will not find a place at intensive care units,” he said, adding that the current 0.05% mortality rate among COVID-19 patients could rise.
Gaza’s Hamas rulers have so far imposed one lockdown, as the long-standing Israeli blockade has crippled the Gazan economy and undermined its public health apparatus.
Israel said it is trying to keep weapons from reaching Hamas, against which it has fought three wars and whose facilities it struck earlier on Sunday in retaliation for a Palestinian rocket launch against one of its southern cities.
“We are not giving Hamas any ‘coronavirus discounts’,” Israeli cabinet minister Izhar Shay told Army Radio. “We will continue responding as appropriate.”