Israel-Hamas war causes around 14% increase in acute malnutrition among Gaza children: WHO report
The deteriorating crisis in Gaza is taking a heavy toll on Palestinian children as acute malnutrition increases among the population, according to a new report from the World Health Organization (WHO).
According to a detailed analysis by the WHO Global Nutrition Cluster, malnutrition among children in Gaza has seen a sharp increase since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas. Not only children, but also pregnant and lactating women are also suffering from malnutrition due to the humanitarian crisis.
This comes as UNICEF reports that more than 17,000 children in Gaza have lost their parents in the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
The report reveals that one in six children under the age of two in Gaza suffer from acute malnutrition, particularly in northern Gaza.
In its 20th week, Israel’s war against Hamas’ shortage of food and water along the Gaza Strip, causing outbreaks of disease and affecting the health of women and children who suffer from low immunity and acute malnutrition, says the WHO report entitled “Nutritional Vulnerability and Situation Analysis – Gaza”.
The northern part of Gaza, deprived of any humanitarian aid from the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF), is the most affected since 15.6 percent of children under the age of two suffer from malnutrition. Nearly three percent of them suffer from severe wasting, a potentially fatal form of malnutrition. This percentage of children in Gaza need urgent treatment to avoid death or medical complications.
Before Hamas’ attack on Israel on October 7 and the war that followed, only 0.8 percent of children under five suffered from acute malnutrition and severe wasting was rare. From this figure to 15.6% in January 2024, this shows how quickly health conditions have deteriorated in Gaza.
This is the largest decline in the nutritional status of a population in three months worldwide. This is an unprecedented situation globally, the WHO said.
The report further reveals that 95 percent of pregnant and lactating women in Gaza live in extreme food poverty, while 90 percent of Gaza children under the age of two are in extreme poverty. These people ate less than two meals the day before the survey and their diet had the lowest nutritional value.
The WHO made it clear that the situation in Gaza could be worse than reported, since the study was carried out in January and since then Israel has attacked the last unoccupied town in southern Gaza, Rafah.
Even though humanitarian aid arrived in Rafah earlier, the situation could be affected now. The WHO report reveals that five percent of children under the age of two in Rafah suffer from acute malnutrition. This justifies the call to protect Rafah from military operations launched by various human rights agencies.
The disparity in malnutrition in southern and northern Gaza has highlighted the need for increased humanitarian assistance to Gaza, as it can help avoid the worst consequences.
UNICEF Deputy Executive Director for Humanitarian Action and Supply Operations, Ted Chaiban, said: “The Gaza Strip is on the verge of an explosion of preventable child deaths, which would worsen the already unbearable level of child deaths in Gaza.
“We have been warning for weeks that the Gaza Strip is on the brink of a nutritional crisis. If the conflict does not end now, child nutrition will continue to fall, leading to preventable deaths or health problems that will affect children of Gaza for the rest of their lives and could have intergenerational consequences,” Chaiban added.
Malnourished children in Gaza increasingly prone to infectious diseases
Around 64 percent of Palestinian households survive on one meal a day while 95 percent limit meals or portion sizes. Adults in more than 95 percent of households in Gaza are eating less to feed their children.
Describing acute malnutrition in Gaza as “dangerous and preventable,” World Food Program (WFP) Deputy Executive Director for Operations Valérie Guarnieri said: “Children and women, in particular, need continued access to healthy food, clean water and health care and nutrition. For this to happen, we need decisive improvements in security and humanitarian access, as well as additional entry points for aid to enter Gaza. »
Currently, households in Gaza live on less than one liter of drinking water per person per day, a third of the three liters needed in an emergency. The overall humanitarian standard for water is 15 liters per person per day for drinking, washing and cooking.
This hunger and thirst has weakened Palestinians living along the Gaza Strip, with most falling ill. The WHO report reveals that 90 percent of children under the age of five suffer from one or more infectious diseases. Around 70 percent of children in Gaza had diarrhea in the last two weeks of the survey, a 23-fold increase compared to 2022 figures.
The executive director of WHO’s health emergencies program, Dr. Mike Ryan, called “hunger and disease a deadly combination.”
“Children who are hungry, weakened and deeply traumatized are more likely to get sick, and sick children, especially those with diarrhea, cannot absorb nutrients well. It’s dangerous and tragic, and it’s happening before our eyes.” , added Dr. Ryan.
