Medics evacuate injured people and cancer patients from the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip on October 28, 2024, to al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City in a joint World Health Organization and Palestinian Red Crescent initiative. Photo by AFP
GENEVA, Switzerland — The World Health Organization said Thursday that the last hospital in Gaza providing cancer and cardiac care had stopped functioning after an Israeli attack.
Israeli missiles strike Gaza hospital, patients evacuated
The UN health agency chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on X that an attack on Tuesday left the European Hospital in Khan Yunis "severely damaged and inaccessible".
It is "no longer functional", he said, adding that a WHO team had evacuated emergency medical staff who had worked through the attacks.
"A strike hit nearby just before the mission," Tedros said, adding that the staff had been taken to the Nasser Medical Complex.
The WHO chief said "the hospital's closure has cut off vital services including neurosurgery, cardiac care, and cancer treatment -- all unavailable elsewhere in Gaza."
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"The shutdown also ends the facility's role as a key hub for medical evacuations, further straining the overwhelmed health system," Tedros said.
The Doctors Without Borders (MSF) charity also highlighted the impact of the closure.
"This was one of the last remaining lifelines in Gaza's shattered healthcare system," it said on X, saying that the Nasser hospital was now the only one functioning in Khan Yunis in southern Gaza.
Nasser, it added, "was also hit on the same day a few hours before the Gaza European Hospital for the second time in less than two months."
MSF said that the territory's remaining hospitals "mostly partially functional, are constantly overwhelmed."
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"Repeated strikes on healthcare facilities are yet more examples of the Israeli authorities making the Strip unlivable."
Tedros insisted that "hospitals must be protected".
"They must never be militarized or targeted. Ceasefire," he declared.
© Agence France-Presse
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