No meals, fainting nurses, dwindling baby formula: Starvation haunts Gaza hospitals
As starvation rises, medical institutions and staff, already struggling to treat war wounds and illness, are now grappling with rising cases of malnourishment.
Advertisement
Weak and dizzy, medics are passing out in the wards, where colleagues revive them with saline and glucose drips. Persistently short of basic tools such as antibiotics and painkillers, doctors are also running out of the special intravenous drips used to feed depleted patients.
In all four hospitals, the doctors described how they are increasingly unable to save malnourished babies and are instead forced to simply manage their decline. The babies are too weak to be flooded with nutrients, which could overload their system and cause them to suffer 'refeeding syndrome,' which could kill them.
Advertisement
In some cases, the fluids that the doctors can safely give to the babies are not enough to prevent them from dying.
'I have seen ones that are imminently about to pass away,' said Dr. Ambereen Sleemi, an American surgeon who has been volunteering since early July at the Nasser Hospital in southern Gaza. The babies were brought to the hospital 'starving and malnourished,' Sleemi said in a phone interview Friday, 'and they haven't been able to get them back from the brink.'
Dr. Nick Maynard, a British surgeon who volunteered at the same hospital until Wednesday, described the shock of seeing a skeletal infant who looked only days old, but was in fact 7 months.
'The expression 'skin and bones' doesn't do it justice,' Maynard said in a phone interview Friday. 'I saw the severity of malnutrition that I would not have thought possible in a civilized world. This is man-made starvation being used as a weapon of war and it will lead to many more deaths unless food and aid is let in immediately.'
Asked for comment, COGAT, the Israeli military department that oversees aid to Gaza, said it 'continues to work in coordination with international actors to allow and facilitate the continued entry of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, in accordance with international law.' Late on Saturday night, the Israeli military began to drop airborne aid over northern Gaza, and said it would pause its military activity for several hours a day in key areas to make it easier to deliver aid by land.
One-third of Palestinians in Gaza are forced to go without food for days in a row, the World Food Program said recently. Of the young children and pregnant women treated at clinics run by Doctors Without Borders in Gaza, roughly one-fourth are suffering from malnutrition, the medical aid group said last week.
Advertisement
Doctors say that many other people have likely died from different conditions and injuries that could have been cured or healed if the victims had not been so weakened by malnourishment. Starvation is causing more mothers to suffer miscarriages or give birth prematurely, to malnourished babies with weakened immune systems and medical abnormalities.
'The result is a rise in infections, dehydration and even immune collapse in infants,' said Dr. Hani al-Faleet, a pediatric consultant at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in central Gaza. 'The immediate cause of death in some of these cases is simple: The baby doesn't get enough to eat, and neither does the mother.'
Starvation has risen sharply since Israel's total blockade on food aid to Gaza between early March and late May, doctors and rights groups say. While Israel has since allowed food in, it introduced a new method of distribution that is flawed and dangerous, making it almost impossible for Palestinians to find food safely or affordably.
Before March, food handouts were mainly distributed under a U.N.-led system from hundreds of points close to where people lived. Now, they are supplied from a handful of sites run by Israeli-backed private American contractors that, for most Palestinians in Gaza, can be reached only by walking for miles through Israeli military lines.
Israeli soldiers have killed hundreds of people walking these routes, turning the daily search for food into a deadly trap.
Advertisement
Some food is still available from shops in Palestinian-run areas, but only at astronomic prices that are unaffordable to the largely unemployed civilian population. A kilogram, or 2.2 pounds, of flour costs up to $30, and a kilogram of tomatoes costs roughly $30; meat and rice are largely unavailable on the open market.
That has forced many Palestinians to routinely choose between two often fatal options: risk death by starvation, or risk death by gunfire to reach food aid sites that are likely to have run out of supplies by the time many arrive.
Israel publicly says the new aid system is necessary to prevent Hamas from stealing the aid. But Israeli military officials have acknowledged to The New York Times that they have no proof that Hamas has systematically stolen food supplied by the United Nations, the main provider of aid to Gaza during most of the war. Israel says that its soldiers have fired 'warning shots' to quell unrest along the roads leading to the aid sites. Maynard and Sleemi described injuries that indicated soldiers had systematically fired at people's torsos.
Israel also blames the United Nations for failing to deliver enough food to alleviate the situation. Israel said Saturday that it had destroyed up to 100 truckloads of food in recent months because aid groups could not distribute the food before it passed its use-by date. U.N. officials say that Israeli restrictions have made it difficult to send convoys through an active war zone.
The food shortages add another challenge to an already very difficult environment for doctors.
'Some staff members have collapsed in operating rooms. Others have fainted in emergency wards because they have not received any proper food,' said Dr. Mohammad Abu Salmiya, the director of Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. 'The burden on them is immense.'
Advertisement
Salam Barghouth, a 3-month-old baby girl treated for malnutrition last week at Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital, is among the youngest Palestinians failed by the new aid distribution system. Her mother, Hanin Barghouth, 22, is too weak to walk to the new distribution sites. Her father, Akram Barghouth, 27, has never managed to reach the sites before the aid runs out, Hanin Barghouth said.
Like most Palestinians, the parents are jobless, rely on donations from relatives and friends and said they survive mostly on falafel balls that cost roughly 10 times their prewar price.
As a result, Barghouth regularly skips meals and says she has lost 29 pounds, a fifth of her body weight, since the start of the war. She cannot produce enough breast milk to feed Salam, who was born April 21, after Israel started the blockade.
At Salam's birth, according to al-Faleet, her doctor, she weighed roughly 6.6 pounds. Three months later, she weighs only 8.8 -- at least 3 pounds underweight, the doctor said.
'I'm breastfeeding her as much as I can, and when I can't, I give her formula -- but that's only when I have it,' Barghouth said. She is reaching the end of a container of formula that she said cost roughly $120, approximately 2 1/2 times the amount it costs outside Gaza.
'She came into the world during a war,' Barghouth added, 'and I'm fighting every day to keep her alive in it.'
While Salam Barghouth can still access medical support in central Gaza, other starving children farther to the north are struggling to find it because aid groups have found it harder to bring supplies to them.
Advertisement
One of them is Yazan Abu al-Foul, 2, a child living with his family in a damaged building beside a beach in Gaza City. His ribs, spine and hip bones jut from his body. An aunt, Riwaa Abu al-Foul, said Yazan's family cannot find enough food to feed him and hospital staff in his area have told them that they cannot provide him with inpatient care.
'They told us there is a shortage of materials and equipment,' Abu al-Foul said in a phone interview Saturday.
Doctors at hospitals in northern, central and southern Gaza described similar hardships in interviews Friday and Saturday.
'There are no nutritional supplements, no vitamins, no premature infant formula, no amino acid intravenous solutions -- nothing,' Abu Salmiya said. 'Their bodies need these basics, and without them they will die.'
This article originally appeared in
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
an hour ago
- Yahoo
New Study Confirms What We've Known About Eggs' Health Impacts All Along
We've known for a while that the idea that eggs are full of "bad" cholesterol isn't exactly accurate. A new study confirms these findings, showing that you should really focus on how much saturated fat you're consuming alongside your morning eggs. And as it turns out, it's often the foods you eat with eggs that are high in saturated fats, thus raise the "bad" cholesterol content in your body, not the eggs themselves. Eggs' reputation have certainly been through the wringer over the past two decades. For years, there were concerns that a regular egg habit would raise your cholesterol, prompting a wave of egg white recipes. But the nutritional community has largely started to change its tune on these great little sources of protein, stating that the cholesterol concerns might have been a tad overblown. Now, new research published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition is providing scientific evidence that supports the idea that you don't need to stress about eggs' cholesterol content. Instead, you should be concerned about the saturated fat that's often present in high quantities in foods that usually go with eggs, according to the findings. It's important to point out that the study was funded by the Egg Nutrition Center, which is a division of the American Egg Board. However, the study notes that the board didn't have a role in the study's design, analysis, or interpretation of the data. Here's what experts make of the new findings, and what they mean for your egg habit. Meet the experts: Sonya Angelone, RDN, is a nutritionist and registered dietitian based in San Francisco, California; Scott Keatley, RD, is co-owner of Keatley Medical Nutrition Therapy; Matthew Black, RDN, LD, is a dietitian at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center What did the study find? The randomized controlled study followed 61 adults and assigned them one of three diets to follow for five weeks. One group had diet that was high in cholesterol, low in saturated fat, and involved eating two eggs a day. Another had people eat an egg-free diet that was low in cholesterol and high in saturated fat. The final group followed a diet that was high in cholesterol, high in saturated fat, and involved eating one egg per week. (This was the control group.) The researchers discovered that people who ate two eggs a day lowered their LDL ('bad') cholesterol compared to the control group. The egg-free group didn't have the same results. The researchers also found that it seems to be the saturated fats that are found in foods like bacon and sausage that are usually eaten with eggs that actually raise LDL cholesterol levels—not the eggs themselves. 'Saturated fat, not dietary cholesterol, elevates LDL cholesterol,' the researchers wrote. 'Compared with consuming a high-saturated fat diet with only one egg a week, consuming two eggs daily as part of a low-saturated fat diet lowers LDL concentrations, which may reduce cardiovascular disease risk.' 'This study's core claim does track with what we've been seeing over the past decade: Saturated fat has a stronger impact on LDL cholesterol than dietary cholesterol,' says Scott Keatley, RD, co-owner of Keatley Medical Nutrition Therapy. 'This is backed by multiple meta-analyses and guidelines have been shifting away from blaming eggs alone and more toward the dietary context in which eggs are eaten.' Why is cholesterol content not actually something to worry about? While people love to hate on cholesterol, it actually has a role in the body. 'Cholesterol is an essential nutrient that has many roles, including functioning as a precursor to hormones and contributing to the integrity of cellular membranes,' says Sonya Angelone, RDN, a nutritionist and registered dietitian based in San Francisco, California. 'This is why your liver produces cholesterol.' Eggs are the primary source of dietary cholesterol, but when you consume more and more cholesterol in your diet, your liver produces less to compensate for the higher amount you're consuming, Angelone explains. 'If you eat less cholesterol, your liver tends to produce more cholesterol,' she says. 'Research has not provided strong evidence that dietary cholesterol, especially from eggs, increases blood levels of cholesterol or increases risk for heart disease.' Consuming dietary cholesterol from eggs as part of a low saturated fat diet does not seem to raise LDL cholesterol levels, according to the study findings. 'The risk for heart disease comes mainly from the other foods on the breakfast plate, like sausage or bacon,' Angelone says. Keatley points this out, too: 'When we're talking about fat and cholesterol, we're only talking about the yolk. Egg whites can and should be on the menu now.' Why should you focus on lowering the amount of saturated fats you're consuming? Scientific data increasing show that saturated fat can be an issue when it comes to your LDL cholesterol levels. 'Current research suggests that saturated fat is the primary component in one's diet that raises 'bad' LDL cholesterol,' says Matthew Black, RDN, LD, a dietitian at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center. 'Additional research also indicates that diets too high in saturated fats can contribute towards developing cellular inflammation and insulin resistance, which is a metabolic condition in which your body's cells do not respond to insulin as efficiently as they should, leading to possible health problems including type 2 diabetes and difficulty losing or maintaining a healthy weight.' Saturated fats also tend to be found in highly processed foods, which are also known to raise LDL cholesterol, Angelone says. Why are eggs so healthy for your diet? Eggs pack a pretty good health punch, and are great for a variety of reasons. 'Containing about 6.5 grams of protein each, eggs are not only considered a complete protein, containing all nine essential amino acids, but they are also regarded as having high bioavailability [the extent to which the nutrients in food are absorbed and utilized by the body], due to their ease of digestibility and absorption,' Black says. Whole eggs, i.e. the yolk and egg white, also contain include essential vitamins and minerals like vitamins A,D,E, and K, B12, iron, and selenium, Black adds. And according to Angelone, the yolks are a good source of iron, containing carotenoids lutein and zeaxanthin, which promote eye health. That's not all! Eggs are also a rich source of choline, a nutrient that supports brain health and isn't found in large amounts in other foods, Angelone says. Dietitians just recommend being mindful of what you're serving up alongside those eggs. 'Overall, if you're healthy and eating eggs as part of a diet that's otherwise low in saturated fat, you're probably just fine,' Keatley says. 'But if those eggs are served with buttered toast, bacon, and sausage, then the eggs alone aren't the issue, but they're not a health halo either. Context is everything.' You Might Also Like Jennifer Garner Swears By This Retinol Eye Cream These New Kicks Will Help You Smash Your Cross-Training Goals Solve the daily Crossword
Time Magazine
an hour ago
- Time Magazine
Why Trump Is Reviving the Presidential Fitness Test
President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday reviving the Presidential Fitness Test, the once-ubiquitous school program that for more than five decades had American children running miles, doing sit-ups, and stretching at least twice a year during gym class. The announcement is part of the Trump Administration's push to address 'crisis levels' of childhood obesity, sedentary behavior, and poor nutrition after Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. released a report in May warning that American children are suffering from chronic diseases at an accelerating rate, largely due to inactivity. 'This was a wonderful tradition, and we're bringing it back,' Trump said at the signing ceremony flanked by a group of prominent and often controversial athletes, including Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker and former NFL linebacker Lawrence Taylor. 'This is an important step in our mission to Make America Healthy Again… What we're doing is very important.' The program, which was retired by President Barack Obama in 2012, involved testing students aged 6-17 on a series of exercises designed to measure strength, endurance and flexibility, including a timed mile run, push-ups or pull-ups, sit-ups and the sit-and-reach stretch. For decades, those who scored in the top percentiles received a Presidential Physical Fitness Award, while others were given a patch or certificate for participation. The revival has already sparked debate among educators and health experts. While some praise the Administration for putting national attention on youth fitness, others warn that the Presidential Fitness Test risks humiliating students who are unable to meet the criteria, potentially fostering a culture of body shaming in schools. Research has found that concerns about body image can emerge as early as age 3, and may become worse over time. But supporters of the move argue that a national standard can motivate students. 'We need to re-instill that spirit of competition and that spirit and that commitment to nutrition and physical fitness,' Kennedy said at the signing ceremony. 'For me, it was a huge item of pride when I was growing up.' Vice President J.D. Vance framed the initiative as part of a broader cultural shift: 'I think all of us have thought at one point in the last few years that kids spend a little too much time on their phones, maybe a little bit too much time in front of the TV,' Vance said Thursday. 'We just want kids to do better. We want them to be healthier.' Here's what to know about the Presidential Fitness Test program. What Is the Presidential Fitness Test? For more than five decades, the Presidential Fitness Test was a staple in public schools: children would complete a series of physical activities that measured strength, agility, and flexibility at least twice a year during gym class. Those activities included running one mile, sit-ups, pull ups, shuttle run, and the sit-and-reach. Students who scored at or above the 85th percentile in all of the tests could earn the Presidential Physical Fitness Award—a patch or certificate bearing the presidential seal, meant to inspire national pride and personal excellence. President Dwight D. Eisenhower first initiated the fitness test when he created the President's Council on Youth Fitness in 1956 after a study revealed that 58% of American children failed at least one of six exercise tests, such as sit-ups, while only 8.7% of European children failed at least one of the same tests. Sports Illustrated at the time called it 'The Report That Shocked the President.' 'Recent studies, both private and public, have revealed disturbing deficiencies in the fitness of American youth,' Eisenhower's executive order read. 'Since the youth of our Nation is one of the greatest of our assets, it is imperative that the fitness of our youth be improved and promoted to the greatest possible extent.' President John F. Kennedy then built on Eisenhower's efforts to create a 'more completely fit American youth,' writing in a Sports Illustrated piece called 'The Soft American' that kids' poor physical fitness was a 'menace' to national security. 'He was lamenting the fact that America had prided itself on a beef jerky toughness, and that we were losing—that we were falling behind Europeans, we were falling behind other nations,' his nephew Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said at the White House on Thursday. The fitness council created under Eisenhower then formalized the Presidential Physical Fitness Award Program under President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1966. 'It is essential that our young people develop their physical capabilities as well as their mental skills,' Johnson said in a statement announcing the awards program. 'Sports and other forms of active play promote good health and help provide our country with sturdy young citizens equal to the challenges of the future.' When and Why Did the Test Go Away? The Presidential Fitness Test was phased out during the Obama Administration in 2012 and replaced with the Presidential Youth Fitness Program, a more individualized assessment that provided 'training and resources to schools for assessing, tracking, and recognizing youth fitness,' according to an HHS website about the program. Schools that adopted the program gained access to web-based tests, standards to testing, calculators for aerobic capacity and body composition, and online training. The initiative measured student fitness with an assessment called the FitnessGram, which measured aerobic capacity, body composition, flexibility, muscle strength, and muscular endurance. The shift came amid growing concerns about the Presidential Fitness Test's psychological impact on children and a broader pivot in public health thinking. Rather than rewarding top scorers, the new program emphasized 'personal bests' and offered resources to help educators and parents promote lifelong physical activity. HHS said that the Obama-era model aimed to 'minimize comparisons between children' and foster more inclusive approaches to health education. 'The new program has moved away from recognizing athletic performance to providing a barometer on student's health,' the HHS website read. 'The program minimizes comparisons between children and instead supports students as they pursue personal fitness goals for lifelong health.' Why Is Trump Bringing It Back? The Trump Administration says the move addresses what it calls 'crisis levels' of childhood obesity, sedentary behavior, and poor nutrition. A May report from the Department of Health and Human Services—led by Kennedy—warned that American children are suffering from chronic diseases at an accelerating rate, largely due to inactivity and poor diet. That report called for a nationwide campaign to combat what Kennedy described as a 'health emergency.' 'American youth have seen a steady decline in activity and cardiorespiratory fitness over decades, contributing to rising obesity, diabetes, mental health disorders, and cardiometabolic risks,' the report said, noting a study from the Physical Activity Alliance that found that more than 70% of children aged 6-17, or 85% in just teenagers, did not meet the 2024 federal minimum recommendation of daily moderate-to-vigorous physical activity. In addition to reintroducing the test, Trump's order directs the President's Council on Sports, Fitness, and Nutrition to develop criteria for the new Presidential Fitness Award and create school programs that reward excellence in physical education. Golfer Bryson DeChambeau will serve as the council's chairman. Trump has often referred to himself as a sports enthusiast. He frequently attends major sporting events and on Thursday said he was 'always a person that loved playing sports.' 'I was good at sports,' Trump said. 'When you were really focused on sports, you thought about nothing else… This is one of the reasons I like golf. You get away for a couple of hours.'
Axios
3 hours ago
- Axios
Vaccine rates for kindergartners fall as exemptions rise
Vaccination coverage among American kindergarteners decreased for all reported vaccines over the 2024-2025 school year, according to new data released Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Why it matters: The drop coincides with measles cases in America hitting a 33-year high, while Trump's appointee to lead the Health Department, Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., upends long-standing vaccine norms. What they're saying:"The decision to vaccinate is a personal one," a Health Department spokesperson told Axios in an emailed statement. "Parents should consult their healthcare providers on options for their families." The spokesperson said vaccination remains the "most effective way" to protect children from serious diseases like measles that can lead to "hospitalization and long-term health complications." By the numbers: Exemptions from one or more vaccines among kindergarteners increased to 3.6% from 3.3%, when compared to the 2023-2024 school year. Exemptions grew in 36 states and in D.C., and 17 states reported exemption numbers exceeding 5%. Idaho and Utah had the highest percentages of kindergarteners exempted from one or more vaccines, at 15.4% and 10.3% each, respectively. West Virginia and Montana did not report numbers to the CDC. Zoom out: America is experiencing its highest annual measles rate count since the disease was declared eliminated in 2000. As of Tuesday, the CDC has confirmed a total of 1,333 measles cases, and 29 outbreaks have been reported in 2025. Of the 1,333 cases, kids under 5 years old make up 29% of confirmed cases, whereas people between 5 and 19 years old make up 37%. targeted herd immunity level of 95%.
