Many of the children we saw in the hospitals are suffering from diseases which are easily treatable in most countries, but untreatable in Iraq because the medicines are virtually unavailable. Teeth are now extracted without anesthetics. Cesarean births in Iraq are now life-threatening events because sutures, one of the supplies we brought, are not available and many of the women now bleed to death. In fact, one hospital had to postpone nine operations until the day we delivered the sutures because they could not proceed without them. Spare parts to repair medical equipment are likewise extremely difficult to obtain, and as a result basic as well as sophisticated medical machines stand idle.
Ambulances likewise remain idle after breaking down.
One doctor pleaded with us to get one ambulance for her hospital. Malnutrition is now widespread among hundreds of thousands of children in Iraq, especially the poor, resulting in increased vulnerability to disease and infectious conditions. We heard one report of a family which sold the interior doors of their house to buy food for their children. The ventilation systems of the hospitals we visited were no longer functioning. Blankets, sheets, and mattresses were worn and torn and long past their normal useful life.