In an attempt to save the lives of Palestinian children hospitalized in Gaza, Dr. Ayaz Pathan did something he never thought he would: allow others — aged 8 to 14, the same as his own children — to die. “We didn’t have an [available] bed for them,” he recounted of his time at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, the largest in southern Gaza. “They were on the floor, and we pulled them to the side while they were still breathing [and] their heart was still beating, knowing that their injuries were unlikely to be survivable. Would they have survived in Jerusalem? Absolutely. In the U.S.? Definitely.”
Pathan, an emergency room physician from North Carolina, volunteered in Gaza from late July to mid-August 2024 as part of what are known as Emergency Medical Teams (EMTs) — groups of foreign medical professionals including surgeons, emergency physicians, nurses, and anaesthetists, that deploy amid humanitarian crises to provide care when the local health care system is overwhelmed. In Gaza, where the health care system is near collapse after the Israeli military has systematically targeted health care facilities and professionals, these foreign medical missions have become particularly vital ….more
