Chad hospital 'overcrowded'
2008-02-06 10:07
N'Djamena - The main general hospital in Chad's turmoil-torn capital lacks both the means and the electricity to care for those injured by heavy weekend fighting between government and rebel forces.
Outside, the powerful stench of dead bodies scattered around the city hanged over some N'Djamena streets. Inside, the hospital's emergency ward was a scene of misery and privation.
A man lying on a stretcher in a gloomy corridor moaned in pain. He said: "I was in the street when a bullet hit me." Doctors had patched up his fractured right leg with a bandage, a bare-bones solution.
"We can't care for people like we should. We lack means and medications," said one doctor, who had been working here since Friday - a day before advancing rebels reached and captured large chunks of the capital.
'We haven't slept or eaten'
There was no room to spare. The wounded occupied every available stretcher, but there was no total count of how many had been admitted since the clashes began.
So far, the International Committee of the Red Cross had counted at least one thousand wounded in N'Djamena's four hospitals, with as many military as civilians among the injured, humanitarian and hospital workers said.
The "reference" hospital sat in the heart of the capital near the presidency - and the hub of the weekend clashes, making it hard to access initially.
One nursing aide, Mahamat, said: "We received hits. We haven't slept since Saturday." Awa, another worker, said: "We're here day and night. We haven't slept or eaten."
But, she added, "one must be patient." The doctors said: "The medical staff is tired. We're deprived of everything." The wounded arrive in wheelbarrows, according to Awa.
26 bodies shipped to the morgue
She said: "We give them basic care and then they leave in wheelbarrows, since we cannot do anything more." Others die. The hospital had already shipped 26 to the morgue, she said.
Indeed, the morgue was full. "We're looking for a place to take the bodies and bury them," said a humanitarian worker. Charred and decomposing corpses were strewn around the city, unclaimed - except by flies.
Pickup trucks only began collecting them as of Tuesday afternoon, and the task would take some time. "There is a risk of an epidemic if we don't intervene rapidly," said Chad Red Cross head Idriss Matar.
Besides caring for the sick, humanitarian workers were confronted with a new problem; the influx of Chadians who unsuccessfully sought refuge in the Cameroon town of Kousseri, just across the Chari river from N'Djamena.
Matar said: "The Red Cross office in Kousseri is overwhelmed and they're asking us for reinforcements, but we don't have the means to send them."
So far, between 15 000-20 000 Chadians had crossed the river, according to the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. Witnesses offered much higher numbers.