Polio vaccine campaign kicks off in Sunday ahead of temporary truce
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00:00Babies at this hospital in southern Gaza were among the first in the war-torn enclave
00:04to receive the vaccine against polio as part of the UN-led emergency campaign.
00:10It comes after UN officials said a baby was left partially paralysed after contracting
00:15the territory's first case of the disease in a quarter of a century.
00:20I was worried and afraid because this is scary, the polio disease. This disease makes the
00:26children unable to move, eat or drink.
00:31According to the WHO, Israel agreed earlier in the week to humanitarian pauses in fighting
00:36to facilitate the campaign, which officially begins on Sunday.
00:40The campaign is to be carried out in three phases in central, southern and northern Gaza,
00:45and during each phase, fighting is expected to halt between 6am and 3pm local time for
00:51three consecutive days.
00:53For the territory's deputy health minister, this isn't enough.
00:58If the international community truly wants this campaign to succeed, it should call for
01:03a ceasefire, knowing that this virus does not stop and can reach anywhere.
01:09A highly contagious disease that mainly affects young children, polio is most often transmitted
01:14through contaminated water and sewage. A problem that is becoming increasingly widespread on
01:19the ground as the Israel-Hamas conflict rages on.
01:23Very large numbers of people are living in 4x4 tents, 4-metre tents. Sometimes 12 people,
01:30sometimes 20 people stand in queues to use these. The sewage water that runs between
01:36these tents and clean water, if it exists, some of it is polluted.
01:40The campaign, which involves two doses that are given orally, is targeting some 640,000
01:45children under the age of 10, with vaccines administered by UN staff and other local health
01:50workers.