Healthcare Infrastructure in Gaza City Under Severe Strain Following Israeli Strikes

Doctors at one of Gaza City’s last functioning hospitals say they are overwhelmed with casualties from Israeli strikes and are having to carry out operations in filthy conditions with few or no anesthetics.

One Australian medic volunteering at al-Shifa hospital told the BBC that every day was a mass casualty event, while another described how a baby had been saved from the body of a pregnant woman who had been decapitated. Israeli forces are now just 500m (1,640ft) away from the hospital as they expand their ground offensive to fully occupy Gaza City, which Israel’s military calls Hamas’s “main stronghold”. Witnesses say tanks are advancing into the city Centre from the south and north-west.

Al-Shifa Hospital, once Gaza’s largest medical facility, is now severely damaged and overwhelmed after nearly two years of war. Doctors are treating critically wounded patients in unsafe, unsanitary conditions, often without anesthesia or basic medical supplies. Volunteer medics describe horrifying scenes, including emergency surgeries on children and a baby delivered from a deceased mother. With only one orthopedic surgeon and constant trauma cases, resources are stretched to the breaking point.