Home » Afghanistan, the alarm of the NGOs: “Full hospitals, lack of medicines”

Afghanistan, the alarm of the NGOs: “Full hospitals, lack of medicines”

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Behind the explosions and the thousands of people seeking escape at Kabul airport is the humanitarian emergency. A reality that Afghanistan has known for years but that in recent months with the advance of the Taliban has increased: and that in the coming months with the cold at the gates, the economy blocked and humanitarian aid stopped, it will only get worse. The alarm was raised by two of the NGOs that have been working in the country for the longest time: Doctors Without Borders and Emergency.

“Our hospital is full. We have more than 300 people already under treatment. In the pediatric ward there are already two patients per bed, but we still struggle to find room for everyone”, says a doctor from Doctors Without Borders from the Lashkar hospital. Gah in a note released by the organization. In the southern district of Afghanistan, the organization receives the large number of patients in the provincial Boost hospital, all other centers are closed due to lack of staff or drugs.

In Afghanistan, MSF continues to work with active projects in Herat, Kandahar, Khost, Kunduz and Lashkar Gah. “We were always in the hospital to treat our patients. On August 21 we treated 862 people in the emergency room, I think it is the highest number ever recorded. Some arrive in critical condition because they have waited for the end of the fighting”, tells the doctor to Lashkar Gah, whose name was not disclosed for security reasons. From 15 to 21 August, 3,698 people were visited in the emergency room and 415 were admitted. About 50 children a day receive treatment in the pediatric ward, while in the therapeutic nutritional center the number of hospitalized patients increased from 25 to 77 in just one week. “We try to leave people as much time as possible in the emergency room, while we try to find space”, explains the doctor: but finding it for everyone becomes more and more tiring.

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In Khost, Doctors Without Borders runs a maternal and child hospital and supports eight health centers in rural areas. Between 15 and 22 August, 402 pregnant women were admitted to the hospital. Thirty-three newborns treated in the hospital’s neonatal ward. Although the city has not suffered the heavy fighting seen elsewhere, the organization’s doctors are having difficulty finding drugs. “People are facing a lot of uncertainty, especially pregnant women. Previously, the hospital focused on providing medical care to pregnant women with obstetric complications. Now to increase access to community health care, we have expanded the our admission criteria and we provide assistance to any pregnant woman to help her give birth, “says MSF.

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64 malnourished children were admitted to the Herat nutrition center from 16 to 22 August, 36% more than in the previous week. During the same period, the Kahdestan clinic carried out 1,725 ​​medical examinations and offered 128 antenatal consultations. In a country with a precarious health system, violence is exacerbating people’s difficulties in accessing medical care. In Kandahar, Afghanistan’s second largest city, Doctors Without Borders runs a project for patients with drug-resistant tuberculosis. During the clashes, staff had to offer remote consultations and reserve supplies of drugs to prevent people from crossing the front line.

Emergency is also in the front row. After the attack on Kabul airport yesterday afternoon, 16 people arrived dead, including very young children, at the center run by the NGO founded by Gino Strada, which has made one of its flags for years precisely due to its presence in Afghanistan . “The wounded were 62, of which 36 were hospitalized to receive important surgical care. Another 10 were medicated and then discharged”, said the medical coordinator. Alberto Zanin during a Zoom briefing. Many injuries were caused by the shock wave of the explosion or by metal shrapnel. “At the moment there are only 4 free places in the hospital, even after the enlargement from 100 to 115 made yesterday in emergency conditions”, Zanin says that in the wounded he was treated “I noticed the extremely absent looks, as if they had seen the ugliest thing in the world, they were invested with the deepest terror”.

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