Jubilee Post News & Views
Special Desk
As coronavirus spreads in Afghanistan, the already burdened hospitals by decades of war face the heat also with worsening Covid-19 crisis.
Beds are in short supply in the city, and resources are desperately stretched. Demand even for oxygen cylinders has been so high during the pandemic that the price of cylinders has doubled in recent weeks. They now cost around $162. You have to know someone in the company selling it to be able to buy it.
Doctors say the already weak healthcare system in the war-torn country is struggling to cope with the pressure of Covid-19. Concerns have been raised about the supply of oxygen and other resources to government hospitals.
A doctor in Kabul described patients’ families having to “fight for oxygen” when cylinders arrived, before bringing it to the intensive care unit themselves.
There are issues with testing too. Low levels of testing suggest there are “substantially” more Covid-19 cases than the official figures, according to World Health Organization (WHO). About 31,000 infections have been recorded to date. Close to half of all tests conducted so far have been positive, one of the highest rates in the world.
One doctor, who wanted to remain anonymous, described a worrying lack of staff in a critical-care unit he worked at in a major state-run Kabul hospital. “One night many patients died because there was no staff to look after them,” the doctor said. He said the patients’ relatives were furious and broke windows at the hospital in anger.
The doctor, now working in a private hospital, added that many families were reluctant to seek treatment at public institutions.
