A senior official from the World Health Organization (WHO) announced on Thursday that Israel has agreed to daily nine-hour humanitarian pauses to support a large-scale polio vaccination campaign in the Gaza Strip. This campaign follows the detection of the first polio case in Gaza in 25 years, found in an 11-month-old baby earlier this month.
The vaccination campaign is set to begin on September 1st in central Gaza and will last for three days. Rik Peeperkorn, WHO’s representative for the Palestinian Territory, stated in a video call from Gaza that there will be a daily humanitarian pause from 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. during the vaccination period. This agreement was made with COGAT, the Israeli agency responsible for coordinating humanitarian access in Gaza.
Peeperkorn mentioned that after the initial three days in central Gaza, WHO will evaluate whether an additional one or two days are needed to vaccinate enough children.
Over 1.2 million doses of the polio vaccine have already been delivered to Gaza, with an additional 400,000 doses on the way. The polio virus was recently detected in environmental samples from southern and central Gaza, raising concerns about a potential outbreak.
Israel’s U.N. Ambassador Danny Danon confirmed that Israel would cooperate with WHO and other organizations to ensure vaccines reach Gaza. WHO noted that while Gaza had high vaccination coverage before the recent escalation of hostilities in October, the ongoing conflict has disrupted routine immunizations, including for polio.
More than 2,000 healthcare workers and community volunteers will aim to vaccinate 640,000 children under the age of 10 during the campaign. Each child will receive a double dose of the novel oral polio vaccine type 2, with the second dose administered four weeks after the first.
The WHO, UNICEF, and UNRWA will implement the vaccination campaign across 392 sites in Gaza. Nearly 300 mobile units will also be deployed to reach children who cannot access the fixed vaccination sites.
In addition, Israel has agreed not to issue any evacuation orders in Gaza on the days the vaccination campaign is in progress. This follows Israel’s issuance of 16 separate evacuation orders in August, which displaced more than a quarter of a million Palestinians.
