Dr. Saleyha Ahsan, a physician who works in the UK, describes her January 2013 trip to the Turkish border to help support emergency medical treatment for Syrians in this article from the medical journal, The Lancet.
Read: Providing medical relief in Syria’s conflict.
There is also a 7 November 2013 article from Dr. Ahsan, featured at the Foreign & Commonwealth Office of the UK, talking about her return trip to Syria in August of 2013.
This SBS Dateline video interview features Dr. Saleyha Ahsan, an emergency doctor from London, talking about her experiences in Syria.
Bab al-Hawa Hospital in northern Syria near the Turkish border, serves Syria’s wounded from what was once an immigration and customs building.
This Australian report describes the situation at the hospital.
Here’s an excerpt:
“The hospital, which reeked of blood, on average, treats around 40 patients a day, mainly as a result from shelling and bombings in the Idlib province. Eighty per cent of patients are civilians – the majority children.”
David Keen, in this 6 November 2013 op-ed in the New York Times, When ‘Do No Harm’ Hurts, makes an excellent point:
“…funding for humanitarian aid in Syria continues to fall far short of appeals, and opportunities for helping local councils and a variety of Syrian relief organizations continue to be missed. So too, crucially, does the opportunity for cross-border relief (notably from Turkey). As in most humanitarian emergencies, United Nations agencies have been putting their faith in delivering aid to rebel areas via government-held areas. But as happened so often in the past, the assumption of government cooperation has proved overly optimistic…
A number of other groups are helping to support the children of Syria. They include:
Mercy Corps
Doctors Without Borders
Union of Syrian Medical Relief Organisations
Syrian British Medical Society
Karam Foundation
Hand in Hand for Syria
War Child International
Doctors of the World UK
“The World Health Organization estimates there are now half a million Syrians with war injuries…”
Syria’s Assault on Doctors / New York Review of Books, 3 November 2013
“Handicap International has estimated that the rate of amputations and spinal cord injuries in Syria is roughly double that of other wars. ”
Syria’s Assault on Doctors / New York Review of Books, 3 November 2013
“At the beginning of 2011, there were more than 30,000 doctors practicing in Syria. Now, more than 16,000 doctors have fled, and many of those left are in hiding.”
Syria’s Assault on Doctors / New York Review of Books, 3 November 2013
“…Medicine has become a weapon of war. Omar Khalili (name changed), a UK-based emergency medicine consultant working with the Syrian British Medical Society, explains how a hospital hit by an airstrike makes headline news on state television. ‘They call it a successful mission against terrorists.'”
Dr. Saleyha Ahsan reports on the difficulties in providing medical care in Syria, in this article in the medical journal, The Lancet.
“Almost two-thirds of the nation’s hospitals have been badly damaged or destroyed, 92 percent of the ambulances in affected areas are out of service, and the vast majority of the nation’s doctors, nurses and other health workers have fled or have been killed. The few health care facilities that remain generally have no fuel, electricity or water…”
See the article at the San Francisco Gate.
Palmyra Relief 