I felt I had to go back to help Gaza's hospitals, says British plastic surgeon
Dr Victoria Rose is a consultant plastic surgeon who worked in Gaza hospitals for two separate periods last year. This is her first-hand story of the war in Gaza.
The word "dire" does not adequately describe the situation in Gaza's hospitals.
On a daily basis when I was working there, I had a list of at least 10 patients, and 60% of them were under the age of 15.
These were tiny children with life-threatening burns and limbs blown off, often losing significant family members in the attacks and left to cope with their life-changing injuries alone.
I first joined the charity IDEALS, which helps medical professionals during crises, in Gaza in 2019. I returned last year, working with orthopaedic surgeons.
I felt compelled to go back after becoming aware that a plastic surgeon from Gaza who trained with me in London had been inundated with complex trauma cases since the war broke out in October 2023.
Our aim was to deliver essential surgical equipment and assist our colleagues with the increasing trauma workload they faced. But as the war progressed, it became apparent that we had a third objective: to bear witness.
I worked at the European Gaza Hospital in March 2024 and then returned in August of that year for a month, working at Nasser Hospital.
The transformation of the landscape during these two visits was staggering. The streets were unrecognisable, just pile after pile of dust and rubble. Such a scale of destruction could only be justified if every single building in Gaza was part of Hamas's infrastructure.
In February 2024, we were denied entry by COGAT – part of the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) controlling activities in the occupied territories – which, regrettably, has become a standard outcome for 50% of foreign doctors attempting to gain access. However, we managed to regain access in May.
This mission was intended to last four weeks at the European Gaza Hospital. However, due to its bombing on the day we arrived and its subsequent decommissioning by the IDF, we were redirected to Nasser for three and a half weeks.
The population had now been relentlessly displaced, bombed in their tents, deprived of water and sanitation, and ultimately starved. I remember thinking it couldn't get any worse – and then they cut the internet.
We ploughed on without essential equipment such as painkillers and antibiotics, patching the patients up, knowing that they were likely to be bombed again.
When we left the hospital we went into the red zone – an area of active fighting that needed to be evacuated.
This meant that nothing could enter without the journey being "deconflicted" by the IDF. Minimal journeys have thus far been deconflicted. Patients struggle to gain entry, and staff cannot leave, as equipment continues to be depleted.
Nasser is the only hospital in the south equipped with a CT scanner, a blood bank, ICU capabilities and an oxygen generator.
I work with two orthopaedic surgeons who run the IDEALS charity. They have been travelling to Gaza since 2009.
IDEALS started the lower limb reconstruction programme in 2013, visiting Gaza every other month and bringing four orthopaedic surgeons back to the UK for short periods of training.
In 2021, I arranged for a plastic surgeon from Gaza to come to London to train with me. He was an incredible trainee and returned to Gaza in February 2023 to take up the post of chief of plastic surgery at Shifa Hospital.
0:54
Shortly after the war broke out, I felt compelled to help him.
All eyes are now on Israel's next move.
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