Anchor:
We are going to introduce you now to an international humanitarian doctor, who lives here in Toronto, but she has been on the ground in Gaza trying to support local doctors. It is her fourth time there since the war broke out. Full disclosure, she is a personal friend. You’ll meet her in a moment, but first, let me show you some of the patients she has met, and she has sent us images from inside the hospital. A warning, they are disturbing.

Muhammad is 10 years old. There is hardly any food, yet he wants to share what he has. Two months ago, Muhammad was shot in the head from a drone while playing in the street. He’s learning to walk again with a quiet determination and a smile so beautiful it hurts.

And then there is 16-year-old Mahmood. He was shot in the abdomen at a food distribution site. He’s malnourished and paralyzed. His family sleeps on the floor beside his bed. They are the ones who give him physio. There are no therapists.
—

Anchor:
You are seeing the best and the worst of humanity there.

Dr. Mel Brecknell:
Yes. Um, it’s sometimes hard to still believe in humanity when we witness what we witness.

—

Anchor:
Dr. Mel Brecknell is volunteering with a Canadian medical nonprofit called GLIA that works under the umbrella of the World Health Organization. She is at one of the few hospitals still operating in Gaza — barely. Much needed aid has not arrived.

—

Dr. Mel Brecknell:
Most of the time we have no soap to wash our hands. And when we do wash our hands, we have nothing to dry them with. We’re missing gloves. We’re missing masks. We don’t have alcohol. Those are the basics that we need. We don’t have enough syringes. We are desperately lacking on so many life-saving medications. And we have watched children, adults, neonates die from lack of medication.
—

Anchor:
There is no morphine or fentanyl for pain in the ER and there is no medication to help heart attack or cancer patients.

Dr. Mel Brecknell:
And we have no way of treating them. So very often we make a diagnosis and just have to leave them.
—

Anchor:
After 2 years of war, there is nothing left but rubble. Gaza’s infrastructure is gone.

Dr. Mel Brecknell:
There’s no sewage. There’s no electricity. There’s no water supply. Desalination plants have all been decimated. So when you drive through, it’s utter disbelief. And the only thing I can think of in my mind, if this were a movie set, you would tell whoever creates movie sets, it was too much, that it was exaggerated.

—

Anchor:
You’ve worked in war zones around the world, you’ve been in some of the worst places in the world at the worst times. You’ve been in Iraq during the war. You’ve been in Ukraine during the war. Does anything compare to what you’re seeing here?

Dr. Mel Brecknell:
No. And one of the things, and this hit me the first time I came here, was that everywhere else I’d been, people can flee. So in Iraq or in Ukraine, they could try and flee to a safe space. There’s nowhere for them to run to.

Anchor:
I see a lovely young boy right behind you sort of waving at the camera.

Dr. Mel Brecknell:
(laughter)
It’s unbelievable. Every single person here has been touched by the war. The estimate is that one in 10 of the people of Gaza have actually been injured — and not talking about the deaths. But yet everybody welcomes us with a smile.

—

Anchor:
But there is also desperation. This woman is trying to get treatment outside of Gaza for her four-year-old daughter who has a heart condition.

Mother:
Help me. Help my baby. Help me.

Dr. Mel Brecknell:
We’re helpless.

—

Anchor:
Dr. Brecknell tells me that not only is there a desperate need for medical supplies, they also need specialized surgeons who could treat patients like that mother’s little girl. But it is very difficult for international doctors to get permission to cross the border into Gaza. She says many are turned away.