Doctors in Basra are swamped with cases of malnutrition and related diseases. And the hospitals themselves are in trouble. In the 1980s this country's medical care was among the best in the region. Now the hospitals lack beds, basic drugs, and equipment. This is the case here in Basra's crowded cancer wards.
Patients rest on dirty woollen blankets, wearing whatever tattered clothes they came in with.
Much of the problems here can be blamed on the economic embargo, but that doesn't explain why doctors are seeing so much cancer. It is a well-known fact internationally that orthopedic surgeons see one case of bone tumor every three years. That's in England. But we are seeing one case of bone tumor every one month. He's originally from Basra, but was educated in the U.S. and the U.K. and has been published internationally.