Gaza’s health ministry has declared a polio epidemic across the Palestinian enclave, blaming Israel’s devastating military offensive for the spread of the deadly virus.In a statement on Telegram, the ministry on Monday said the situation “poses a health threat to the residents of Gaza and neighbouring countries” – the latest sign of a worsening public health emergency caused by Israel’s genocidal war since October.Calling the epidemic a “setback” to the global polio eradication programme, the ministry called for an “immediate intervention to end the [Israeli] aggression and find radical solutions” to lack of potable water and personal hygiene, damaged sewage networks and removal of tonnes of rubbish and solid waste.
This must be the first time in history an epidemic was declared without a single case of the disease.
NGOs discovered the poliovirus in areas of Gaza in samples taken over a month ago, and they have been looking for specific cases since then.
So far, they have not found any.
But the Gaza health ministry saw an opportunity to politicize this news to demand Israel stop attacking its Hamas bosses. The declaration they issued demands an end to the "brutal Israeli aggression" yet does not demand an increase in vaccines.
99% of Palestinian children were immunized in 2022, and 89% in 2023. Young children who have not finished the series of vaccines are at risk. It appears that it is possible that the virus was spread from Egypt, where the polio virus was detected last year (although no evidence of an outbreak there, either, that I can find) and it may have entered Gaza before October.
It is important to note that most forms of polio that spread today are the weakened types that originated from oral vaccines taken before 2015 that have not mutated into something deadly. Over 95% of those with the virus do not exhibit any symptoms at all (75%) or only exhibit mild symptoms that appear like any other virus. Ironically, sometimes the spread of these weakened viruses cause a community to have passive resistance to more dangerous forms of polio even without immunization. In other words, the existence of the virus is not at all evidence of an epidemic or outbreak.
Make no mistake, this is still a serious finding and requires a serious response. Israel is working with international organizations to bring millions of vaccines into Gaza. It is also vaccinating its own soldiers out of caution.
But when the health ministry declares an "epidemic," it is not a serious response. There is no epidemic. It is anti-Israel propaganda and an attempt to allow Hamas to win the war.
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