GAZA CITY, Gaza – The World Health Organization (WHO) has helped to medically evacuate over 1,000 patients from Gaza to countries in the WHO European region. On reaching this milestone, Dr Hans Henri P Kluge, WHO regional director for Europe, thanked the 17 countries that have offered urgent medical care and other countries that have provided specialised transit for Gazan patients since October 2023. Now, Dr Kluge has intensified his personal outreach to all member states of the region to expedite evacuations and appeal for more hospital beds and specialised care that is not available in Gaza.

“To the governments, health-care workers and citizens of the 17 countries who responded so willingly to our medevac request: thank you. Your solidarity reflects the belief that health is a human right, and that empathy knows no borders. Your actions are a template for other countries to follow, and we encourage them to do the same. While 1,000 medevacs to the European region is an important milestone, this remains a drop in the ocean of need. An estimated 3800 children are still waiting for urgent specialised treatment outside Gaza. It’s not too late to help, because every child saved is a future secured. I call on the European region to rise to the occasion, because saving lives is not political; it’s moral, it’s urgent, and it’s within our reach.”

 The vast majority of evacuees are children.

“WHO/Europe calls on countries in the European region to urgently scale up evacuations of sick and injured Palestinians requiring critical medical care. Innocent lives – many of them children – hang in the balance. We must act now, or history will not judge us kindly,” said Dr Hans Henri P. Kluge, WHO regional director for Europe.