2024-03-19 18:25:45
Two French doctors returning from Gaza, following spending several weeks in the European Hospital, recounted the horrific situation in the Strip, where they were performing surgeries in “terrible” conditions, amid a severe shortage of disinfectants, the wailing of the sick and injured, and “inevitable” deaths.
Doctor Khaled Ben Boutrorif, an emergency medicine specialist from Toulouse, said: “There is no longer any way to disinfect hospital departments.”
The doctor went to the southern Gaza Strip from January 22 to February 6, with the “Palmed” Medical Association, which is concerned with helping the Palestinians.
The sixty-year-old doctor added during a press conference in Marseille: “We were finding it difficult to treat the sick and injured. There were no stretchers. We were forced to treat the seriously injured on the ground.”
“Surgeries in terrible conditions”
His colleague Pascal Andre, an expert in infections, observed between February 8 and 22 that “many patients develop dangerous infections following surgical operations,” because the department “is not clean enough” in the absence of disinfectants.
The French doctor confirmed, “The situation is horrific and has no justification.”
Pascal Andre added: “Surgeries are carried out in terrible conditions, because people cannot obtain appropriate disinfectants beforehand.”
Ben Boutroif believed that the conflict has been going on for a long time, and that “it is no longer possible” for the medical teams at the European Hospital to “maintain any kind of organization.” He said: “The laboratory suffers from many problems, and any analysis necessary to diagnose an infection or follow up on a disease is no longer possible.”
‘Avoidable’ deaths
Ben Boutroif confirmed that one of the difficulties is represented by the large number of displaced people who have taken refuge in the hospital, and who are now “spread in the corridors, waiting halls, and stairs,” and in “some elevators as well… wherever they are.”
He added: “Despite this, we must continue to provide care to patients in complete chaos.”
Doctor Andre continued, saying with great emotion: “I saw in the resuscitation department patients with tubes in the mouth receiving artificial respiration and their eyes open due to the absence of a hypnotist,” explaining that some humanitarian aid trucks remain stuck at the border between Egypt and the Gaza Strip.
Israel controls the entry of ground aid into the Gaza Strip. Which remains insufficient given the enormous needs of the population of 2.4 million people, most of whom threaten famine, according to the United Nations.
“No narcotic substances”
Doctor Andre confirmed that some patients “were screaming in pain due to the absence of narcotic drugs,” stressing that the lack of medications also affects people with chronic diseases.
He said that in February he witnessed the death of a young mother “due to her not receiving diabetes treatment,” stressing that these are “completely avoidable deaths, but they are not talked regarding, and they are not counted.”
In addition to the victims of the bombing, Ben Boutrorif explained that he received in the emergency department “many sniper victims.”
Ben Boutroif said: “It is clear that they were shooting at children. The hit was very specific and very calculated,” mentioning the case of an 11-year-old girl who was left paralyzed following a bullet hit her in the neck.
The two doctors regretted the lack of interest in their testimony since their return to Europe, and Andre affirmed, “I feel pain from this silence.”
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