Published 1 June 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b2214
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;338:b2214

News

Medical aid teams trying to access Gaza question UK government support

Owen Dyer

1 London

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

A medical aid team that recently returned to the United Kingdom after unsuccessfully trying to gain access to Gaza has questioned the efforts of the UK Foreign Office to support their work.

The team of four, led by Omar Mangoush, a cardiac surgeon at London’s Hammersmith Hospital, had intended to help establish a cardiac surgery unit at al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. But the UK doctors spent most of May waiting at the Egyptian controlled Rafah crossing, where they said they had watched medical teams from Ireland and the United States successfully enter Gaza with the backing of their countries’ embassies in Cairo.

They visited the crossing every day for two weeks only to be told that Cairo had not cleared them to cross. The team went on a brief hunger strike but soon realised that the Egyptians would not be moved, said Christopher Burns-Cox, a retired consultant in general . . . [Full text of this article]


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to StumbleUpon StumbleUpon   Add to Technorati Technorati    What's this?

Access jobs at BMJ Careers
Whats new online at Student BMJ