As Israeli forces continued their push to take full control of Gaza City on Wednesday, reports emerged that another skeletal child whose plight was highlighted by the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) has now died. Her name was Jana Ayed and she was nine years old.
A total of 150 children have perished through acute malnutrition in the Gaza Strip since the start of the war, according to the latest figures from the Palestinian health authorities.
Announcing Jana's death in an online video message, UNICEF Communication Manager Tess Ingram explained that she had been treated in hospital twice for the condition and recovered each time, only to waste away on 17 September, amid continuing Israeli aid restrictions.
"The world failed Jana so many times, failed her on food, twice," Ms. Ingram insisted. "A little girl forced to endure so much pain because of deliberate decisions that were made to restrict the entry of food into the Gaza Strip."
Ms. Ingram explained that UNICEF had originally evacuated Jana for treatment in southern Gaza more than a year ago and that she had recovered. "I remember holding her frail little hand and helping her into the ambulance," she recalled.
Stalked by hunger
Once Jana was better and discharged from hospital for the first time earlier this year, she and her mother, Nesma, returned to northern Gaza during the ceasefire to be with their family.
But the aid blockade allowed hunger to return, claiming the life of Jana's two-year-old sister, Jouri, in August.
At the time, Ms. Ingram warned that Jana was "barely hanging on" in a Gaza City hospital where she was receiving treatment.
She also stressed that Gaza's war-shattered health system was unable to give the child the care that she needed.
"Her last hope, medical evacuation out of the Gaza Strip, failed her. No country stepped up and was able to get Jana out," the UNICEF worker said.
Gazan youngsters who suffer from moderate and severe acute malnutrition receive Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) at the enclave's last remaining hospitals, including at Friends of the Patient Society Hospital in Gaza City where Jana was being treated.
No hospital capacity
Only days ago, the UN World Health Organization ( WHO ) warned that four more hospitals had been forced to shut down in the north of the war-torn enclave this month alone.
Across Gaza, just 14 hospitals remain, the UN health agency said, while humanitarians have warned repeatedly that they are overwhelmed with trauma cases and struggling to cope.
'Children are being punished'
UNICEF insisted that the story of Jana and Jouri was a "devastating reminder that children's lives in Gaza are put at risk, not just by airstrikes, but also by the living conditions".
It also stressed that Gaza's malnutrition crisis has reached catastrophic levels with the entire child population under five - more than 320,000 children - at risk of acute malnutrition.
In July alone, 13,000 children were acutely malnourished, "the highest monthly figure ever recorded", and representing more than a 500 per cent increase since the start of the year, UNICEF explained.
"This war must end now. Aid must be allowed into the Gaza Strip, including food and nutrition supplies. Humanitarians must be allowed to do their jobs," Ms. Ingram said.
"The children of Gaza are being punished by these decisions and it's killing them."
How medical evacuations happen
Medical evacuations (medevacs) from the Strip coordinated by WHO follow a strict seven-step protocol, from the initial patient referral by a doctor to evacuation by the UN health agency, based on a list submitted to host countries which is then approved by the Israeli authorities.
Latest WHO medevac data indicates that 7,841 patients have been helped to leave Gaza since war erupted there on 7 October 2023, following Hamas-led terror attacks on Israel. More than 5,330 of these patients were children. Approximately 15,600 patients still need medical evacuation out of Gaza.
On 29 September, WHO supported the evacuation of 14 patients and 38 companions from Gaza to Jordan and 15 patients and 65 companions to Italy, from a field hospital run by UN partner the Palestinian Red Crescent Society on the Coastal Road in Al-Mawasi.
"Patients, companions and caregivers will start from here with ambulances, buses, and escort from WHO so that they get safely through the combat zones to Kerem Shalom," explained Dr Athanasios Gargavanis, WHO trauma surgeon and acting Gaza Team Lead.
He explained that from Kerem Shalom, the Palestinians would leave the Strip before being transported to Ramon Airport in southern Israel, then on to host countries.
"This is just the tip of the iceberg," Dr Gargavanis said. "Many more medevac missions are needed, and many more receiving countries are needed. The World Health Organization is committed to supporting such missions."
WHO continues to call for the restoration of medical referrals to the West Bank and East Jerusalem and for more countries to accept patients.
