Dear Neil and ICHG members,
Thank you all so much for your continuing advocacy concerning the daily tragedies affecting children occurring in Gaza.
Our charity, Maternal and Childhealth Advocacy International (MCAI), has been working over the last 16 months to address the massive and increasing need for medical evacuation as one possible way of addressing the urgent medical needs of people living in the increasingly dangerous Gaza.
Whilst ICHG, which is a great organisation, is concentrating on children, we urge you to also include pregnant women, injured, and chronically ill adults in your advocacy.
Returning to medical evacuation, MCAI has been writing for more than a year to foreign secretaries in 7 countries (including the UK) who have the ability to provide hospital beds in sufficient numbers to care for the seriously ill and injured in Gaza. Only the UK responded to the attached request (summarised below) but continued in 3 successive responses to refuse to provide hospital placements.
Here is a summary of latest letter that we sent:
An urgent medical refugee endeavor for critically ill and injured patients in Gaza
On 14th April 2025, a World Health Organization (WHO) Representative Rik Peeperkorn for the UN News<https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/04/1162206> stated the following: “Far too few patients have been able to leave Gaza for the urgent care they so desperately need. We (WHO) estimate that up to 12,000 patients need medical evacuation but, since the blockade we have only been able to evacuate 121 people including 73 children. We call for the immediate resumption of medical evacuation through all possible routes. That should happen now.”
Despite global expressions of outrage because of the destruction of healthcare facilities, deaths and injuries of health workers, and blockades on the introduction of food, safe water, equipment and medications, there remains an overwhelming need for concrete actions to address the continuing humanitarian medical crisis in Gaza.
Therefore, because of the above, the only remaining and timely option for providing healthcare for the most vulnerable people is the transfer of pregnant women, newborn babies, children and adults who are dangerously ill, or with life-threatening or life-devastating injuries from Gaza to one or more places where effective short- and long-term medical care can be delivered.
Our medical charity Maternal & Childhealth Advocacy International (www.mcai.org.uk<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.mcai.org.uk_&d=D...) has been calling for 16 months for a programme aimed at delivering a large scale Medical Refugee Endeavour. We have written to the Foreign Offices in 7 medically well-resourced countries asking for them to each consider providing hospital placements for 500 critically ill or injured patients, together with at least one close family member for support.
We must stress that this suggested program is not about ethnic cleansing; it is the temporary life-saving rescue of people whose homeland is no longer able to support their complex medical needs.
To put this programme into operation, the following international actions will be essential.
Firstly, a long-term ceasefire will be needed to allow for the logistics of such a major activity to be successfully and safely undertaken. Ideally a UN Security Council Resolution would support this.
Secondly, individual countries will need to agree to donate the large numbers of hospital beds and supportive accommodation for attendant family members.
Thirdly, large amounts of medical equipment, drugs, food, and clean water will be needed to stabilise patients for evacuation. Any supplies remaining could be used to treat those left behind.
Finally, hospital ships moored off the coast of Gaza could enable large numbers to receive urgent medical care before their transfer to the donor countries.
We are aware of the many objections that will be put forward to oppose this endeavor.
As a first step, we wonder whether The UK Government could facilitate a meeting, bringing together representatives of medical and refugee organisations which have relevant experience and influence. It could include experienced journalists, with the aim of exerting pressure on governments, especially Israeli and Palestinian, but equally on potential donor countries who might be willing to provide the placements for this planned medical refugee assistance
Our hope is that, through this initiative, you will:
1. bring about increased public awareness of the worsening situation in Gaza and the occupied Palestinian territories
2. put pressure on third governments to take action
3. facilitate a process whereby humanitarian input can save lives on a massive scale
It is imperative in our view that this debate happens. It will provide a public forum that will address the concerns of so many who are watching with horror what is happening in Gaza and feel so unable to help.
We anxiously await what we hope will be positive response to this request on behalf of all those unbearably suffering daily in this continuing terrible conflict.
With kindest regards
Professor David Southall OBE, MD, FRCPCH
Consultant Obstetrician Liberia and Professor of Paediatrics UK
CHIFA profile:
David Southall is a retired Professor of Paediatrics and Honorary Medical Director of the Maternal and Child Health Advocacy International, MCAI, in the UK.
(www.mcai.org.uk) He is also on the board of the International Child Health Group. director AT mcai.org.uk