File Photo: A premature baby receives treatment at Nasser hospital, Khan Younis, where MSF teams are supporting the neonatal intensive care unit of the paediatric department. Palestine, Gaza. Photo courtesy of MSF website,
Dr Ahmad Al-Farra, director of pediatrics and maternity at the Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis, said on Wednesday that the hospital has completely run out of baby formula. “These babies have no time,” he said, warning of an impending “humanitarian catastrophe.”
The hospital, which operates one of the last functioning neonatal intensive care units (NICUs) in Gaza, is now over capacity following the destruction of the nearby European Hospital in an Israeli airstrike on 13 May.
Medical staff say they are overwhelmed and unable to care for additional infants without basic supplies.
The shortage is part of the wider collapse of Gaza’s healthcare system 20 months into a genocide and an over three-month-long complete Israeli blockade imposed on 2 March.
Infant formula, painkillers, antibiotics, and hygiene products remain critically scarce.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health has appealed for immediate international intervention to prevent infant deaths.
The United Nations (UN) has reported that one in 10 babies born in Gaza is now either premature or underweight, and local doctors are seeing a rise in miscarriages, stillbirths, and congenital disorders linked to malnutrition and lack of maternal care.
Since October 2023, Israel has killed over 55,300 Palestinians, half of whom are women and children, according to the Palestinian health ministry.
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