Lice, scabies, rashes plague Palestinian children as skin disease runs rampant in Gaza’s tent camps

Associated Press

KHAN YOUNIS, Gaza Strip (AP) — Skin diseases are running rampant in Gaza, health officials say, from appalling conditions in overcrowded tent camps housing hundreds of thousands of Palestinians driven from their homes. Palestinians say they have no soap to wash themselves, their children or their clothes during the summer heat. The sanitation system has collapsed amid Israel’s bombardment and offensives, the U.N. says. The World Health Organization has reported more than 160,00 cases of lice, scabies and skin rashes. At one hospital, doctors report hundreds of skin disease cases a day, including a steady stream of children, covered in spots, scabs, rashes and lesions that turn into worse infections.