As the world gears up for another pandemic, Gaza’s healthcare system is in ruins

Since the apparent end of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2022 – or in some regions the year after – rumours of the next worldwide pandemic have spread on- and offline. Conspiracy theorists have claimed that a new global health emergency would be declared by the end of 2023 and that lockdowns and all kinds of other restrictions would again be imposed worldwide.

Those fears were not entirely unfounded.

A myriad of experts, figures and politicians have been warning simultaneously of a looming “second pandemic”. Tech mogul and philanthropist Bill Gates stated with certainty in 2022 that, “We’ll have another pandemic.” This was echoed by US President Joe Biden saying in the same year that: “We need more money to plan for the second pandemic – there’s going to be another pandemic. We have to think ahead.”

Then, in April this year, Biden announced his administration’s release of its new Global Health Security Strategy, which set out actions that the US “will take over the next five years to prevent, detect, and effectively respond to biological threats wherever they emerge.” The United Kingdom had already announced its own initiative, with the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) having launched its 3-year strategy in mid-2023 “to prepare for and respond to health threats and build the capabilities and technologies to protect the country in the future.”

Since then, it has been in fashion for both developed and developing countries to set out their strategies to combat and prepare for the next pandemic. With this era of preparedness being based particularly upon the key concepts of surveillance, prevention and containment, such experts and reports have claimed that the next pandemic will be caused by a non-Covid pathogen, apparently making it unrelated to the respiratory virus which brought the world to a standstill.

It may have taken the form of mpox – formerly known as monkeypox – which has been spreading throughout parts of Africa, South Asia and is now touching Europe. Although it was not so deadly nor as widespread when it emerged initially in 2022, it is reported to be deadlier and more virulent this time round due to its form as clade I rather than its previous emergence as clade II.

Read: Mpox threatens Yemen, government gears up for potential risks

Already, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared mpox in central Africa to be a public health emergency of international concern, and there have been mutterings in media outlets around the world of the increasing seriousness of this pathogen. There is also the example of avian influenza, or “bird flu”, another pathogen which is causing epidemiologists concern in its recent upsurge.

Despite the reported danger, media and the experts they quote have tried to reassure everyone that mpox or other diseases will certainly not be the new Covid and will not herald in new lockdowns and restrictions related to movement, travel and other freedoms. Unlike Covid-19, they say, we are not caught off guard and there are existing vaccines to deal these viruses and their evolutions. They do, however, urge consistently for greater preventative measures – usually without specifying exactly what those should be and how far they should extend – and for a boost in pandemic preparedness in the case that mpox or anything else that does grow into the predicted next pandemic.

The alarmists and conspiracy theorists, unsurprisingly, are convinced that such public health emergencies have either been engineered by certain interested parties or that they will at least be exploited by governments and their Establishments to plunge the world into lockdown again. That view is apparently given credence by public health experts’ warning that the relevant authorities are making the same mistake in neglecting the combatting of these outbreaks, as happened with Covid-19 when it first emerged.

According to such experts, public health officials and bodies must be granted greater powers in tackling these outbreaks, including the ability to order and enforce restrictions similar to the last pandemic. That also includes the completion, signing and enforcement of the much-lauded global Pandemic Preparedness Treaty which the WHO and certain member states have been trying to push through.

Read: Saudi Arabia, Morocco sign MoU to strengthen health sectors, pandemic preparedness

Whether or not the alarmists are right to be so concerned, the fact remains that the international community is gearing up for the next pandemic.

However, there are some places that are left out of such efforts and are side-lined or neglected, not least the Gaza Strip.

While public health advocates preach and mobilise around the need for more robust monitoring and detection systems, the besieged Palestinian territory’s own healthcare system is in ruins, all but destroyed over the past eleven months of Israel’s military offensive. The plight of the Palestinians has not only been marked by their efforts simply to survive the bombings and killings, and their repeated forced displacement by the Israeli occupation forces, but it has also resulted in serious infectious diseases spreading across the enclave.

Gaza’s water and sanitation crises have allowed diarrhoea and chickenpox to spread through the besieged population, and now polio has emerged. Last week, the fatal virus paralysed a 10-month-old baby in Gaza, in what was the territory’s first such case in 25 years. Rather than just being a one-off case, the fatality heralds a period of polio’s potential spread and re-emergence throughout Gaza, weeks after the virus was initially detected in the Strip’s water and sewage system.

The incident has alerted both regional and global authorities, with the Israeli military and the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, agreeing to three separate three-day and zone-based pauses in the conflict, to allow the vaccination of around 640,000 children against polio.

Nevertheless, the WHO’s head has stated that, “Due to insecurity, damage to roads and infrastructure, and population movement and displacement, three days in each area is unlikely to be enough to achieve adequate coverage.” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus stressed the need for a long-term solution to the issue. “Humanitarian pauses are welcome, but ultimately, the only solution to safeguard the health of the children of Gaza is a ceasefire.”

Until such calls are heeded, Gaza’s humanitarian and healthcare crises will only deteriorate further, leaving the besieged population vulnerable to polio as well as other deadly diseases. While the international community gears up for the next pandemic, it is abandoning Gaza and leaving it lagging way behind in not only its preparedness, but also even the maintenance of a basic healthcare system.

Read: Gaza is the dystopia that conspiracy theorists fear, so why do they still support Israel?

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.