To: Professor Mumtaz Patel, President, Royal College of Physicians

Subject: Collective Petition from UK Physicians to the Royal College of Physicians – Urgent Call to Action on the Gaza Humanitarian Crisis

Dear Professor Patel,

We, the undersigned physicians, trainees, nurses, allied health professionals, and other colleagues working in internal medicine and hospital care, write to you with deep alarm at the catastrophic humanitarian crisis unfolding in Gaza. As clinicians dedicated to evidence-based care, health equity, and the protection of life, we feel compelled to speak with urgency and moral clarity.

As of May 2025, the World Health Organization and United Nations report that the healthcare system in Gaza has effectively collapsed. An estimated 94% of hospitals have been damaged or destroyed, and the majority of primary and secondary health facilities are non-functional. At least 57 children have already died from malnutrition, with over 71,000 children under five projected to suffer acute malnutrition in the coming months. An estimated 470,000 people face catastrophic hunger, and access to clean water, medications, and electricity remains critically limited.

The consequences of this breakdown are widespread:

• Patients with chronic diseases such as diabetes, renal failure, and cancer have been left without medications, dialysis, or palliative care.
• Acute medical conditions, including trauma, infections, and obstetric emergencies, often go untreated due to blocked ambulance access, facility destruction, or lack of supplies.
• Healthcare workers are operating under siege, many unpaid and under threat, forced to provide care in bombed-out facilities or makeshift tents.
• Infectious disease control has collapsed, and the population is now at extreme risk of waterborne illness, respiratory disease, and cross-infection in overcrowded shelters.
• Vulnerable populations, including women, children, the elderly, and people with disabilities, bear a disproportionate burden of harm.

These conditions are not the result of natural disaster. They are the foreseeable outcome of a deliberate and prolonged blockade, systematic attacks on healthcare infrastructure, and obstruction of humanitarian aid — in direct violation of international humanitarian law, medical neutrality, and basic principles of public health and ethics.

We are aware that the Royal College of Physicians may issue or has issued statements regarding the crisis. While such acknowledgements are welcome, they must not substitute for the clear, urgent, and sustained leadership this moment demands. Anything short of a public condemnation of the deliberate starvation, siege, and dismantling of healthcare systems risks being seen as symbolic rather than substantive.

We respectfully call on the Royal College of Physicians to:

• Publicly and unequivocally condemn the use of starvation, siege, and healthcare obstruction as violations of international law and human dignity, and call for an immediate and lasting ceasefire.
• Support and align with United Nations Security Council Resolution 2728, adopted in March 2024, which calls for unimpeded humanitarian access, protection of medical workers, and the restoration of basic services.
• Join or lead a coordinated response with other Royal Colleges and global medical organisations, including the World Medical Association and humanitarian health NGOs, to advocate for health system recovery in Gaza.
• Support calls for legal accountability for those responsible for the obstruction of healthcare, targeting of medical facilities, and denial of essential treatment to civilians.
• Provide a platform for RCP members to engage in advocacy and humanitarian action, and to reaffirm our collective ethical responsibility in the face of mass civilian suffering.

As physicians, we are entrusted with the care of life, grounded in the principles of justice, non-maleficence, and human dignity. Our silence in the face of such widespread suffering would betray these foundations.

We stand ready to support the College in any effort that upholds these values and defends the right to health for all, including the people of Gaza.

Sincerely,

 [The Undersigned]

 UK Physicians Community

 May 2025