2/4/2024
on World Cancer Day: Aldameer Association for Human Rights – Gaza.
Cancer patients in the Gaza Strip live in very tragic conditions, and face the threat of death everyday.
Today, Sunday, February 4, 2024, marks World Cancer Day, which is the day on which the world comes together to combat cancer and save patients from the dangers of this disease or death. It can be prevented by increasing awareness among individuals and governments. World Cancer Day comes in light of the continued suffering of cancer patients in the Gaza Strip. Cancer patients in the Gaza Strip live in very dangerous conditions in light of the lack of treatment, and suffer pain due to the disease, added to the occupation’s continued killing and destruction. The lack of security, the closure of the crossings, and depriving them of movement to receive the required treatment, in addition to the accumulation of the wounded in hospitals and giving them priority, which prompted some hospitals to empty beds for the people most in need, whose number has doubled in light of the aggression targeting 2.3 million, including cancer patients, which has become more and more intense. By committing crimes against them, including directly targeting, killing, destroying and bombing the Turkish Friendship Hospital, which is the only hospital specialised and qualified to treat them, and targeting and killing the medical staff who care for them.
According to reports and information issued by health authorities, 10,000 cancer patients in the Gaza Strip suffer from tragic conditions, as the Addameer Association monitored the death of 12 cancer patients due to not receiving appropriate treatment and care regularly. Furthermore, cancer patients in the north and Gaza do not receive any treatment and care for them due to the destruction of the majority of hospitals alongside medical centres which are out of service. There is also no availability of any type of medication for cancer patients.
Before the start of the aggression on October 7, 2023, there were more than 2,000 patients waiting for medical referrals for treatment in hospitals in the West Bank, Jerusalem and neighbouring countries. They were unable to travel to the hospitals to which they were referred, and treatment protocols for cancer patients were not completed, which led to the death of most of them.
It is worth noting that Cancer patients were suffering from difficult conditions in the Gaza Strip, including a shortage of therapeutic and diagnostic equipment, an almost constant shortage of modern medicines and chemotherapy, and a shortage of palliative treatment. The occupation also prevents them from travelling for treatment due to the restrictions and siege imposed on the Gaza Strip for 16 years. Accordingly, the Addameer Foundation demands the following: 1. The international community must assume its legal, moral and humanitarian responsibilities, and take immediate and serious action to provide treatment for cancer patients in the Gaza Strip. 2. Health and humanitarian organisations and the Relief Agency transport patients for treatment in hospitals in the West Bank, Jerusalem, and within the Green Line, and introduce medicines, supplies, therapeutic and diagnostic medical devices, and chemical drugs for cancer patients in the Gaza Strip, while securing their hospitals to receive treatment.
Addameer Association for Human Rights – Gaza