29 August 2024
Updated 30 August 2024
Israel has agreed to a series of “humanitarian pauses” in Gaza to allow for the vaccination of children against polio, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said.
The campaign will aim to vaccinate around 640,000 children across the Gaza strip and will begin on Sunday, senior WHO official Rik Peeperkorn said.
It will be rolled out in three separate stages, across the central, southern and northern parts of the strip. During each stage, fighting will pause for three consecutive days between 06:00 and 15:00 local time.
The agreement comes days after UN officials said a 10-month-old baby had been partially paralysed after contracting Gaza’s first case of polio for 25 years.
Around 1.26m doses of the novel oral polio vaccine type 2 (nOPV2) are already in Gaza, with 400,000 additional doses set to arrive soon.
The vaccinations will be carried out by UN staff and other local health workers. Over 2,000 health and community outreach personnel have been trained to administer the vaccine.
Louise Wateridge, a UN spokeswoman in Gaza, has called for a ceasefire to allow the vaccination programme to run safely.
"We cannot vaccinate children under a sky full of bombs and strikes, we cannot vaccinate children who are fleeing for their lives," she told Radio 4's Today programme on Friday.
"Any military operations during the time we are trying to roll out a vaccination campaign will affect our ability to deliver these vaccinations to children," she explained.
Ms Wateridge said children will receive two oral doses this week, and will need a repeat vaccination four weeks later.
The WHO is aiming to achieve 90% vaccine coverage across the strip, which is needed to stop transmission of the virus within Gaza.
An agreement is in place for an additional fourth day of vaccination and humanitarian pause if needed to achieve that level of vaccination.