The Urgent Struggle for Health Justice in Gaza: A Crisis of Human Rights and Inequity
Gaza’s health system has faced decades of deliberate neglect, blockade-induced shortages, and repeated damage due to armed-conflict. The war in Gaza has torn apart the already fragile health system, leaving behind not only death, despair, distress, and damaged infrastructure, but also a severe moral crisis. The conflict shows a critical link between human rights violations and health inequities, as civilians endure dire conditions marked by displacement and severe shortages of basic needs. Gazans are not only fighting illness but also confronting systemic injustices that disrupt their basic right to health.
In this International Journal of Health Planning and Management editorial [opens new tab], Mansour et al argue that health justice in Gaza goes beyond access to healthcare, involving breaking up the institutional and political forces that systematically deprive people of their most basic human rights. They describe how achieving health justice in Gaza is very challenging, but it is not beyond reach, lying not only in the immediate delivery of humanitarian aid but in the long‐term and strategic planning of a health system that can endure, adapt, and eventually thrive in the face of crisis.
Read the editorial here [opens new tab]
Citation
Mansour, W., Theobald, S., Fouad, F.M., Than, K.K., Baba, A. and Raven, J. (2024), The Urgent Struggle for Health Justice in Gaza: A Crisis of Human Rights and Inequity. Int J Health Plann Mgmt. https://doi.org/10.1002/hpm.3882
Further information
- Presentation: Wesam Mansour delivered Health justice in fragile and shock-prone settings: from theory to practice towards building resilient health systems at HSR 2024. Read the slides from this session here.
- Webinar: ReBUILD for Resilience and Health System Global’s Thematic Working Group on Health Systems in Fragile and Conflict-Affected Settings [opens new tab] presented a webinar which explored the role of global health actors in promoting peace and securing health justice in conflict-affected settings. Watch it here.
- Blog post: An article summarising the webinar and drawing conclusions can be read here.
Image: 23-10-28 07 Ruins in Gaza. Felton Davis via Flickr [opens new tab]