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Iraq's Woes Are Adding Major Risks To Childbirth
Amira Saeed tends to daughter-in-law Noor Ibrahim after her emergency Caesarean section at al-Jarrah Hospital in Baghdad.
(By Naseer Nouri -- The Washington Post)
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The Iraqi health-care system was once considered one of the best in the Middle East, with the most up-to-date equipment and well-educated doctors. Iraqis could get basic health care free, and each town had at least one hospital. That changed when the U.N. Security Council imposed an embargo after Iraq invaded Kuwait, leading to the 1991 Persian Gulf War.
Medical instruments and drugs used to be shipped from Germany, France, Japan and Switzerland. Now, hospitals buy cheaper supplies from Egypt, Jordan and India, the doctors said.
At al-Jarrah, staff members do not have fetal monitors, so they use a trumpetlike device held over the womb, the doctors said. The delivery room has a chair with rusted metal footrests and an examining table with a hole in the leather cushion.
The hospital has three ultrasound machines, but no one to operate them at night because administrators cannot find a qualified person to stay at the hospital during the curfew.
And when the hospital runs out of blood, which it often does, staff members have to go to Baghdad's central blood bank, located in a neighborhood with frequent shootings, too dangerous for even an ambulance to reach. What do they do when they need blood at night? "We hope for sunrise," said Sadik, the anesthesiologist.
Many private hospitals have closed, and the public hospitals are overwhelmed by victims of the many car bombings and mortar attacks that happen across the city each day, the doctors said.
"I don't know why this is happening," said Najeed, a former military doctor who wore a gray suit and speaks perfect English. "Is this a punishment?"
'They Killed Her Baby'
Ibrahim arrived at al-Jarrah on the afternoon of Dec. 24. She was in shock with a ruptured uterus and tears in her vagina.
The obstetrician performed an emergency Caesarean section. It was too late to save the baby. Now, the doctor had to concentrate on the mother.
The baby, the obstetrician said, died because the forceps had crushed his head. Ibrahim lived but might never be able to have another child.
"Look at this disaster," the obstetrician said as she lifted the baby's head, the top of which was slightly caved in. On the right side of his forehead was a spot of blood and a dark purple bruise.
"They killed her baby," the obstetrician said. Then she wrapped him in the pink blanket and sealed the box.
