Israel WHO launches vaccination campaign for 44,000 children in the Gaza Strip
The World Health Organization (WHO) plans to launch an extensive vaccination campaign in the Gaza Strip on Sunday.
05.11.2025, 19:06
SDA
44,000 children who could not be reached in the two years of the Israeli war against the terrorist organization Hamas are to be vaccinated against measles, mumps, rubella and polio, among other diseases, within ten days. The next doses are to be administered in December and January.
Following the emergence of the polio virus in the Gaza Strip, the WHO had already carried out polio vaccination campaigns during ceasefires in the summer of 2024 and February 2025. Although there were mobile vaccination teams, some children could not be reached.
The WHO estimates that 20 percent of children under the age of five were never or only insufficiently vaccinated due to the conflict. At the same time as the vaccination campaign, the UN Children's Fund, Unicef, will assess malnutrition in order to be able to help the young people as quickly and specifically as possible. According to the WHO, the general vaccination rate in the Gaza Strip before the war was 98 percent. Today, it is estimated to be less than 70 percent.
