US doctors appeal to UN to evacuate 2,500 children from Gaza for treatment

GAZA, Jan. 31 (YPA) – A number of American doctors who served in the Gaza Strip appealed on Friday the United Nations to evacuate 2,500 children, who are at risk of death, to receive the necessary and urgent treatment abroad.

The doctors addressed their calls to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who later wrote a post on X saying “he deeply moved” by their testimony and concern and that “2,500 children must be evacuated immediately and ensured they are able to return to their families and communities.”

“Some of the 2,500 children will die tomorrow, some will die the next day,” said Dr. Feroze Sidhwa, an emergency surgeon at San Joaquin General Hospital in Stockton, California, but the vast majority need simple procedures that cannot be performed in Gaza’s devastated hospitals.

“Under the ceasefire agreement, there was supposed to be a mechanism for medical evacuation, but so far we have not seen this process,” added Dr. Thaer Ahmad, an emergency physician and assistant professor at the University of Illinois.

“There is talk of allowing Palestinians to cross into Egypt with no right of return,” said Dr. Ayesha Khan, an emergency physician and assistant professor at Stanford University who worked at Al-Aqsa Hospital in Gaza from Nov. 26 to Dec. 28.

“There are 25,000 men, women and children in Gaza awaiting medical evacuation, including 2,500 children, said Dr. Mahmouda Sayed, an emergency physician and assistant professor at the University of Washington and Washington State University.

A UN agency recently reported that the war in the Gaza Strip was devastating for children, adding that more than 13,000 Palestinian children were killed, about 25,000 others injured, and more than 25,000 others were hospitalized due to malnutrition.

AA