Over 90 die in Iraq hospital fire, UAE expresses condolences

NASIRIYAH: The UAE has expressed its solidarity with the friendly Iraq over the victims of the fire that struck Al Hussein Hospital in Nasiriyah on Monday night.

In a statement on Tuesday, the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation expressed its sincere condolences to the government of Iraq and to the families of the victims of this tragic accident, also wishing a speedy recovery to the injured of the hospital fire.

The death toll from a fire that swept through a hospital coronavirus ward in Iraq climbed to 92 as anguished relatives buried their loved ones and lashed out at the government over the country’s second such disaster in less than three months.

Health officials said scores of others were injured in the blaze that erupted late on Monday at Al Hussein Teaching Hospital in Nasiriyah.

The deadly fire in Al Hussein Hospital, which doctors said was fuelled by oxygen canisters exploding, was the second such incident in Iraq in three months.

The tragedy cast a spotlight on what many have decried as widespread negligence and mismanagement in Iraq’s hospitals ater decades of war and sanctions.

LEADERS’ REACTIONS: President Barham Salih on Twiter said both fires were “the result of endemic corruption and mismanagement that disregards the lives of Iraqis.”

At the city’s morgue, anger spread among people gathered as they waited to receive their relatives’ bodies.

Prime Minister Mustafa Al Kadhimi convened an emergency meeting and ordered the suspension and arrest of the health director in Dhi Qar provice, the hospital director and the city’s civil defense chief. The government also launched an investigation.

The prime minister called the catastrophe “a deep wound in the consciousness of all Iraqis.”

In the holy city of Najaf, the dead were laid to rest. Mourning families stood over coffins in the mosque to say one last prayer.

Their tears were tinged with anger, with some saying the disaster could have been prevented. They blamed both the provincial government and the central government in Baghdad.

“Medical teams and relatives of victims are finding it difficult to identify most of the corpses,” a source at the provincial forensic science department said.

39 WOMEN VICTIMS: An official tally listed in local media said 39 of the victims so far identified were women.

Ahmed Resan, who witnessed the blaze, said it began with smoke. “But everyone ran away — the workers and even the police. A few minutes later there was an explosion,” he said. He said firefighters arrived an hour later.

“The whole state system has collapsed, and who paid the price? The people inside here. These people have paid the price,” Haidar Al Askari seethed at the scene.

FUNERALS: In Al Dawaya, east of Nasiriyah, a joint funeral was held for six members of a single family who had died in the inferno. In Al Nasr, north of the city, mourners laid to rest two brothers and two sisters who perished in the flames.

Other funerals were held in the Najaf, where mourner Yunus Saleh blamed politicians for the tragedy.

“My family lost five members and a sixth wasn’t found. We couldn’t identify his body,” he said.

“Where else would something like this happen? Where? The (political) parties burned them.”

Hundreds of young protesters shut down private hospitals in Nasiriyah to pressure the authorities to open the doors of a new public hospital.

Overnight, firefighters and rescuers — many holding flashlights and using blankets to extinguish small fires — searched through the ward in the darkness. As dawn broke, bodies covered with sheets could be seen laid out on the ground outside the hospital.

Ali Khalid, 20, a volunteer who dashed to the scene, said he found the bodies of two young girls locked in embrace. “How terrified they must have been, they died hugging each other,” he said.

Ali Karar, a cleaner at the hospital, said the ward had only four fire extinguishers and no fire alarm system. Firetrucks ran out of water quickly, he said.

On the morning ater, distraught relatives searched for traces of their loved ones amid charred blankets and belongings.

‘FAILED GOVERNMENT:’ In Najaf, an angry Imad Hashim sobbed ater losing his mother, sister-inlaw and niece. “What should I say ater losing my family,” the 46-year-old said. “No point demanding anything from a failed government. Three days and this case will be forgoten like others.”

The ward, opened three months ago, contained 70 beds in three large halls. Maj. Gen. Khalid Bohan, head of Iraq’s civil defence, said the building was constructed from cheap, flammable materials.

In April, at least 82 people — many of them coronavirus patients or their relatives — were killed in a fire at a Baghdad hospital that broke out when an oxygen tank exploded. Iraq’s health minister resigned over the disaster.

Doctors have complained of lax safety at Iraq’s hospitals, especially around oxygen cylinders, and have described the institutions as ticking bombs.