For Children, Iraq War Casualties Have Just Begun

by Ferry Biedermann

For Hanan, and for countless other children, the killing continues. Doctors in emergency rooms and in children's wards in Baghdad are seeing more and more injured children who have stepped on unexploded ammunition, or simply picked it up to play with.

Iraqis say these are all cluster bombs, but the nature of the explosives is hard to determine, and probably varied. The Iraqi army left tanks, armored cars, artillery and accompanying munitions strewn all over the place when it collapsed. And the U.S. forces saturated some areas with several kinds of munitions that may not have exploded on impact.

Hospitals are barely able to cope with this new influx. Some have closed down partly or completely for lack of staff, or power, or both. Many are short of medicine and equipment.

Children such as Hanan are given priority when it comes to painkillers, but Medical City is short of them. An adult who was shot in the leg by looters five days ago has received only one injection since then. He is in agony.

To add to the large numbers of children hurt in explosions, emergency rooms are now getting large numbers of victims of looters. Yet another new category is burn injuries. People are running out of fuel, and are trying to fill up from reserves left in tanks around the city. Their methods are unsafe and on many occasions they have tried to do this while lighting a cigarette.

But Hanan was only tending the sheep in a field near their house in Youssefiyeh village outside Baghdad, says her guardian Saad Ali, a distant relative who cares for Hanan and her seven siblings. "She was with her older sister when they stepped on something. Her sister was killed, and now look at Hanan."

Ali is sitting next to the wounded girl on her grubby bed, waving a piece of cardboard to circulate the air in this smelly, stifling hospital atmosphere. He looks shattered.

"We'll have to amputate her left foot," says Dr. Bassam Al-Taye, pointing at the blood-soaked bandage. She is also hurt in the stomach but the doctors cannot operate until she stabilizes.

As he speaks, another child is brought in, injured in the hand and arm. "He picked up a canister and threw it away," his mother says. "Just then it exploded."

Many of the older victims of U.S. bombardment still need hospital care. Beds are at a premium and many patients are sent home after quick treatment.

Among the biggest problems hospitals still face is lack of security. Some were looted in the immediate aftermath of the fall of Baghdad. Others found it hard to operate because staff could not come to work.

Several hospitals and clinics are still closed as a result, or operate only emergency rooms. Others are short of clean water and electricity, although the Red Cross helps with that.

"We have enough supplies here by way of medicine and equipment," says Roland Huguenin, spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) in Baghdad. He says the ICRC distributes the drugs to hospital when needed. It has also helped restore clean water supply.

He sees lack of security and power as the biggest threat, apart from imminent shortage of food. Both security and power are essential for aid to be distributed and for normal life to resume.

Huguenin says all ministry buildings except for the Ministry of Oil, which is protected by U.S. soldiers, have been destroyed. "There is nothing to start a government with," he says. "I fear a chaos that may become a threat to the humanitarian situation."

The Red Cross brought back its international staff over the weekend. Medicins sans Frontieres, like the ICRC has had volunteers in the city throughout the fighting. But many other international organizations still consider Baghdad too dangerous to operate in.

Huguenin is deeply concerned about the food situation. Pre-war estimates suggested that people had four to five weeks of reserves stored up. That means they could be running out.

Some food markets have reopened, and vegetables and eggs brought in from the countryside are available at relatively high prices. But 60 per cent of the population already dependent on government food rations and that level of dependence is likely to rise.

The World Food Program sent a convoy of food rations from Amman last week. But it is concerned about the lack of security in Baghdad, and has halted the convoy outside the city. With so many other problems, a critical food situation now could spell a serious humanitarian disaster.