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Children are the ones who suffer the most from the lack of decent healthcare services. (IOL photo) |
BAGHDAD — Iraq's health care system, once the pride of the region, has become the worst in the Gulf and Middle-East.
With a lack of investments and an ever-increasing brain drain, the decadent heath structure is putting the lives of millions of Iraqis at risk.
"Unfortunately we aren’t able to cope with the requirements countrywide," says Taha Abdel-Rahman, a Health Ministry media officer.
"There aren’t investments and thousands of professionals have fled Iraq, leaving locals without proper assistance," he added.
The pharmaceutical factories producing basics, including antibiotics, decreased production as investments nearly stopped.
Hospital equipments, X-ray machines, dialysis machines, scanners, instruments and theatre essentials need to be repaired or replaced.
The only scanner machine working properly in the capital Baghdad is near collapse.
Civil society organizations, mainly the Iraqi Red Crescent, have been struggling to help by supplying hospitals with clean water and medicines.
But according to Abdel-Rahman the demand is so high that doesn’t cover ten percent of all country’s requirement.
"No new hospitals and maternities have been built since 1986 although the need has increased three times since than."
The situation stands in stark comparison to what it used to be nearly three decades ago.
The UN 1989 State of the Nations Report recorded Iraq as having over 90 percent access to "free high quality health care."
For two years running, Iraq was awarded a special UN prize for its excellence.
Thirteen years of the most draconian embargo ever imposed by the UN after the 1991 bombing, led to disaster in a country which had imported - broadly - seventy percent of everything.
No Medicine
The health system also suffers chronic shortage of medicines.
Drugs supplies are so low that Iraqis hospitalized are usually asked to track down their own medicine.
Pharmacist Mustafa Samaraye, the owner of a private pharmacy in the capital Baghdad, said prices have increased for all products, with a mind-boggling 200 percent in some cases.
"Some Iraqis searching for medicines think we are using from the shortage at public hospitals to get money for our own pocket, but the truth is that even for us to get medicines is becoming rare and expensive," Samaraye added.
"Even drugs for cancer treatments aren’t available at public hospitals anymore and we have to try getting from neighboring countries and in this case, the price comes added to security expenses."
A doctor from the emergency department at Yarmouk Hospital, who prefers not to be named, said the shortage of medicines and apparatus has reached uncontrolled levels.
"Two weeks ago I lost a child because I didn’t have an infant needle and the medicine couldn’t be used IV but the mainly are patients with head and spinal cord injuries who need scanner and our isn’t working properly and die because we couldn’t diagnose the problem before," the doctor said.
"We are lacking pain killers and IV fluids. Sometimes I think to quite medicines because I cannot stand more people dying for lack in proper medical care."
Brain Drain
Taha Abdel-Rahman, the Health Ministry media officer, says nearly 700 medical employees have been killed since the 2003 US-led invasion.
"Thousands of doctors, pharmacists, university teachers, nurses and dentists have fled to neighboring countries, scared from wave of violence towards their minority."
Doctor Ayad Mohammad Bilal, neurosurgeon, recently moved to Jordan after being continuously threatened by militants.
At one point he had his son kidnapped, having to pay a ransom of 50,000 dollars to have him released to safety.
"I know how important my specialty is for Iraqis, especially under actual circumstances of violence, but I had to protect my family before I find one of my loved ones in a hospital, waiting for me to make his surgery," Bilal said.
Ibn Albitar Hospital’s director, Hussein al-Hilli, says there isn’t any neurosurgeon in Iraq today though the demand is 300 percent more than during the invasion in 2003.
"Every suicide bombing or attack in Iraq generates dozens of injured people, many of who require urgent neurosurgical intervention, but unfortunately with the lack of professional they are left to die."
Hiba Mohammad Rabia’a symbolizes the problems suffered by the majority of Iraqis.
"During the delivery of my oldest son we couldn’t drive at night to the nearby hospital because of the imposed curfew and the baby was born at home," she recalled.
"During the second delivery last January, I had to make a caesarean but the hospital didn’t have anaesthetic and my husband had to buy one in the black market for 800 dollars, before available in pharmacies for less than 20 dollars," Rabia’a added.
"Today in Iraq, even to have a baby, you might die from pain. Is it the democracy Americans promised us when they invaded Iraq?"
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