Packed with refugees, Palestinian camps face grave threat if coronavirus spreads

A worker sanitizes the exterior of a house in al-Fari'ah refugee camp as part of a campaign conducted by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) and the Popular Committee to prevent the spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), in the Israeli-occupied West Bank March 31, 2020. REUTERS/Raneen Sawafta

BETHLEHEM, West Bank/AMMAN (Reuters) - Malka Abu Aker has seen her crowded refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank swell year upon year since fleeing there over 70 years ago, with the arrival of new generations and those escaping successive Mideast conflicts.

But with the coronavirus spreading locally, the 73-year-old worries that her congested Palestinian camp is primed for contagion, and blames the U.N.'s cash-strapped Palestinian aid agency for not doing enough to help.