Louise Wateridge, a spokesperson for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), said an estimated half a million people in Gaza could be flooded with sewage once winter rains start, Al Jazeera reports citing Wateridge’s comments to the UK newspaper Financial Times.

“When it rains, sewage is going to pile up in lower [elevation] areas,” she told the newspaper, adding that all displaced people “are using some kind of makeshift toilet and essentially trying to just get the sewage away from their shelter. But that doesn’t mean it’s not accumulating near somebody else’s or on the street.”

In winter, Wateridge said, malnourished people “will get sicker because it all works together against their health and wellbeing”.