Eight-year-old Ruba Saadeh spends her days confined to the tent she shares with her family in Gaza, her body dotted with inflamed red blisters as chickenpox sweeps through overcrowded camps like the one they live in.
Doctors and displaced families in Gaza say the highly contagious disease has surged in recent months as war has forced hundreds of thousands of Palestinians into cramped tent camps with no clean water for hygiene.
"The doctor told us she needs daily cleaning and should be isolated for 20 days," Ruba's 19-year-old sister Alaa told AFP. "But how can we isolate her? We all live in one tent."
UNICEF said health officials had already recorded more than 9,300 suspected cases of chickenpox across Gaza in early July, concentrated mainly in Khan Yunis in the south.
"That's the most densely-populated area in the Gaza Strip... families are sheltering almost on top of each other," spokeswoman Louise Wateridge told AFP.
