Health Minister Fahrettin Koca shared a letter on social media he sent to World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus on the situation in Gaza. Koca pleaded with the international health body to ensure access to the Palestinian city suffering under Israeli blockade and constant bombardment.

Addressing Tedros, Koca said life in Gaza, "if it can be called ‘life,’ has been under very harsh war conditions for over two weeks."

"I am aware of the attention you, as the director-general of the World Health Organization (WHO), are giving to this extraordinary situation. Above all else, I can imagine how you feel as a human being and a human health advocate dedicated to serving humanity. I would like to thank you and your Organization, of which we are members, for all your efforts in providing Gaza with the health care it desperately needs. However, I would like to state that we wholeheartedly believe that from now on, what you can do for Gaza, where innocent civilians lose their lives and injured children cannot access health care, is much greater than what you have done so far. The days, that we are going through, impose on WHO the mission to prevent further violations of human dignity," Koca said in his letter.

"I have no doubt that with the decisions that will be taken under your leadership, the opportunities you will mobilize, and also your personal reputation, you have the potential to take steps that will make the expectations of world communities come true and will be greatly appreciated. Seeing that the WHO is far behind these expectations, or even knowing that it is behind many political wills, is merely unacceptable. I do not think that our expectations from this 75-year-old organization, which has achieved successful results against many crises during its lifetime, are unrealistic," Koca said in the letter, which was also published in Arabic and Hebrew.

"We demand the obstacles in front of us be removed so that we can provide health care to the injured children or those whose cancer treatment is interrupted. And, of course, we expect with great hope that this organization, which we are members, will demonstrate a much greater strength and competence," he added.

While limited aid delivery to the blockaded Gaza Strip began last weekend, there are no security guarantees for getting aid to hospitals in the northern strip, WHO warned on Tuesday.

Underlining the "huge risk" for people delivering relief, Rick Brennan, WHO regional emergencies director for the Eastern Mediterranean region, told a press briefing in Geneva, "We do not have security guarantees to deliver aid to Al-Shifa Hospital" – the region’s largest hospital – or "other hospitals in the north." So delivering aid to that part of the Gaza Strip is currently impossible, Brennan said.

"WHO remains unable to distribute essential, live-saving health supplies, delivered through the Rafah crossing into Gaza on Oct. 21 and 22, to key referral hospitals in northern Gaza due to ongoing hostilities and lack of security guarantees," he said. "Awaiting WHO supplies are some of the largest, most important health centers in Gaza, such as Al-Shifa Hospital, where bed occupancy is already at close to 150% and the Turkish hospital, which is the main provider of services for cancer patients," Brennan added. WHO calls for an immediate humanitarian cease-fire so these supplies can be delivered safely throughout the area, he said.

He noted that the U.N. agency has additional medicines and medical equipment on standby across the border in Egypt that are enough to provide surgical interventions for 3,700 trauma patients, basic and essential health services for 110,000 people and care for 20,000 chronic disease patients.

Earlier, Türkiye’s Health Ministry dispatched health care professionals and medical equipment to Egypt, which hosts the Rafah border crossing with Gaza.

Koca told Tedros that WHO must ensure the safety of health care provision in Gaza. "I would like you to know that my country is ready to deliver the much-needed health care to Gaza for victims of the war, especially sick children and to treat the wounded in Türkiye and has put in place the necessary preparations. What is missing in the quest to save lives is to put in place the necessary conditions.

"Among the mottos of the WHO is ‘Health for all’ and the other is ‘Leave no one behind.’ My call upon you, as a health minister, as a human being, and as a father, is to demonstrate that these two mottos are also the truth," the minister appealed in his letter.