Across the entire Gaza Strip, there are more than 15,000 pregnant women on the verge of catastrophic levels of hunger.
There has been a rise in premature births and maternal deaths – and many women are forced to give birth without access to medical support.
In early November, the United Nations agency for sexual and reproductive health warned that only two out of 20 health service points and the remaining hospitals in north Gaza “are still functioning as they struggle to operate without supplies, fuel, food or water.”
This means that for the thousands of pregnant and breastfeeding women in north Gaza – if they survive the daily massacres and airstrikes carried out by the Israeli military – access to prenatal and neonatal health care is heavily restricted.
And complicated and high-risk pregnancies linked with negative outcomes have increased, while access to safe childbirth services has dramatically decreased, especially in the north. Transportation challenges and a shortage of medical personnel have compounded the crisis, the agency says. …more
