Print This Page Email This Page See Most Sent

• Are Iraqis' Guerrilla Tactics Understandable? • Change Is Slowly Coming For These Women • How to Cope with Workplace Stress

— GENEVA (Reuters) - The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Friday that Baghdad's medical system had all but collapsed because of combat damage, looting and fear of anarchy.

It said that hardly any medical or hospital support staff were reporting for work and that patients had either fled or been left without care.

"The medical system in Baghdad has virtually collapsed," the Geneva-based humanitarian group said in a statement.

Earlier, spokeswoman Nada Doumani had told Reuters that the ICRC doubted that any hospitals were still working in the capital because of the anarchy on the streets.

"The ICRC is profoundly alarmed by the chaos currently prevailing in Baghdad and other parts of Iraq. Lawless persons, sometimes armed, have been ransacking and looting even essential public facilities such as hospitals," it said.

The ICRC called on U.S.-led coalition forces, which control most of the capital, rapidly to restore order saying that it was their duty under the Geneva Conventions setting out the rules of war.

"In areas under their control, the coalition forces have specific responsibilities as occupying powers under international humanitarian law," the ICRC said.

Doumani quoted ICRC official Roland Huguenin-Benjamin in the Iraqi capital as saying that "probably there are no more hospitals functioning because of looting, lack of medical personnel; people are scared."

"It is anarchy," she quoted him as saying.

Reuters correspondents in Baghdad said looting continued two days after U.S. forces swept into the center of the capital, ending President Saddam Hussein's rule.

An ICRC team ventured out on to the streets but had not been able to visit all the city's hospitals Friday, Doumani said.

However, they did go to the 650-bed Medical City where they found very few people. "Operating theaters are no longer functioning. There are no more instruments in any case," Doumani said.

On Thursday the Swiss-based agency had reported that the Al Kindi hospital in central Baghdad was attacked by armed looters who had stripped it of everything, including beds, electrical fittings and medical equipment.

Doumani said that Al Kindi was empty Friday.

She said that there were risks of epidemics because the city was also without clean water and electricity.

President Bush promised Iraqis in a videotaped message Thursday that the United States and its war allies would help maintain law and order. A spokesman said it would take time for the security situation to stabilize.

photo credit and caption:

Staff at a Baghdad hospital treat a wounded man that hospital sources say was hurt in a rocket attack by U.S. forces, April 11, 2003. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Baghdad's medical system had all but collapsed because of combat damage, looting and fear of anarchy. I Photo by Oleg Popov/Reuters

Copyright 2003 Reuters News Service. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.