GAZAN children are set to receive medical care in Ireland in “the coming weeks” under humanitarian plans set out by the government.
Health minister Stephen Donnelly will seek approval for the plans to treat 30 “very sick” children on Wednesday.
He said the children needed complex care and some may have been injured by attacks and were unable to be treated in Gaza because hospitals have been destroyed by the Israeli military.
Donnelly thanked Irish healthcare professionals and the Irish Red Cross, who have been “working behind the scenes for quite some time” on the proposals.
Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Donnelly said Ireland was responding to a request from the World Health Organisation regarding the care of the children, whom Egyptian health authorities needed assistance with.
He said: “It is a modest step, obviously in the scale of the slaughter of tens of thousands of innocent children, women and men.
“But it is an important step and another way Ireland is playing a role in [responding to] this horrific conflict.”
Donnelly (above) said the scheme will run on a “child-by-child” basis.
He said all of the 30 children are expected to begin to be treated and accommodated by the end of the year.
“We will assess how it has worked out for the children and the parent or guardian that has come with them, with the view to potentially doing more.”
The Irish Red Cross is to provide accommodation for the children across the country.
Asked what the post-care plan for the children was, Donnelly said they would be “fully entitled” to apply for international protection.
He said: “We all know that in some of these cases some of these children, their homes, their villages, their towns, have been levelled by the Israeli military forces, so there may well be people who have nowhere to go back to.”
Irish deputy premier Micheal Martin (above) said: “We would hope they would be in a position to go back to an area that would have a ceasefire in place.
“We would not be putting them back into harm’s way immediately or anything like that.”
It is reported that the plan will not allow for orthopaedic patients, due to domestic waiting list pressures in the area.
