The Collapse Of The Health Environment Is Exacerbating The Spread Of Skin Diseases In Displacement Camps In Gaza.

The tents in the Gaza Strip are no longer a refuge for displaced people from the ravages of war; instead, they have become breeding grounds for skin diseases. Chickenpox, scabies, and lice are rampant among thousands of families due to the collapse of the health system, the scarcity of clean water, and the lack of medicine. With rising temperatures and continued overcrowding, the spread of infection is increasing daily, adding further suffering to lives already exhausted by displacement, hunger, and the blockade.

Inside a modest tent in Mawasi Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, Shaima Abu Arabiya, 43, watches as her five children spend their nights itching and in pain, after they all contracted chickenpox, while lice have spread among all members of the family in a scene she says she has never witnessed before.

Shima told the Palestinian news agency (Shehab) that the skin rash was no longer just passing pimples, but had turned into severe inflammations in some of her children, leaving painful marks on their bodies. She added that their nights had become sleepless, as the children constantly scratched their bodies until they sometimes bled.

She confirms that attempts to maintain hygiene are no longer effective in the absence of water, as the family is forced to bathe in seawater almost daily, but she believes that this has not prevented the spread of infection, but has only increased her feeling of helplessness in the face of a disease that is infiltrating everyone.

When she turned to medical centers in search of treatment, she was met with a harsher reality; she found only limited quantities of medicine, not enough to treat one child, while all members of her family needed treatment.

The tragedy of Shaima’s family does not appear to be an exceptional case, as the same scene is repeated in dozens of displacement camps spread throughout the Gaza Strip, where overcrowded tents, with the extreme heat, lack of water and deteriorating sanitation services, have turned into an ideal environment for the spread of infectious skin diseases, especially among children.

About a month ago, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) warned of an impending new health crisis in the Gaza Strip, stressing that rising temperatures, overcrowding, scarcity of clean water, and declining health services are all factors that are driving a widespread outbreak of scabies, chickenpox, and other skin diseases, at a time when the health system is suffering from a severe shortage of medicines and medical supplies.

The figures reflect the scale of the escalating crisis, as medical teams recorded approximately 9,300 cases of infectious skin diseases, including chickenpox, scabies, and lice, in the past two weeks alone, across 130 health centers, indicating the widening spread of infection within displacement camps and shelters.

With the war continuing, clean water unavailable, and the health sector’s ability to respond eroding, skin diseases appear to be just another chapter in the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.

Among the displacement tents, the suffering is no longer limited to bombing and hunger, but has extended to the bodies of children and displaced people, at a time when specialists warn that what is happening today may be just the beginning of a more dangerous health wave, unless urgent action is taken to stop the collapse and provide the minimum requirements for life and medical care