| IRAQ THROUGH THE EYES OF A DOCTOR |
| Written by Maria Elena Salinas |
| Monday, December 08 2003 |
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| Not a day goes by without another headline about Iraq: soldiers killed or injured, religious protests, the situation is improving, things are getting worse, there is anarchy, coalition troops are in control, they love us, they hate us. To know the truth, you really have to consider the source - or the "filter," as President Bush likes to call the media that report on the darker side of the war.
So I decided to find out what is really going on in Iraq. Not through the eyes of a journalist, a politician or a spin master, but through the eyes of a doctor. Therefore, I called Dr. Ricardo Angora. I met him in Baghdad in April. He was standing across the hall from our hotel room wearing a vest that said "Medicos del Mundo," the Spanish translation of "Doctors of the World," an organization dedicated to promoting health and human rights in areas of conflict.
We visited him at the Al Kharj Hospital as he and his team performed an operation that saved the arm of a young man from being amputated. The hospital, which specializes in orthopedic surgery, was spared by looters because many of the doctors had armed themselves with weapons to fend off the aggressors. It was a tense situation in which valiant doctors risked their own lives to save others. It was also a situation Dr. Angora was familiar with.
As a member of Doctors of the World, the Spaniard had already witnessed the misery brought on by military conflicts in the Balkans and Afghanistan. Yet he was impressed with what he found when he first arrived in Baghdad: a city without life, without people walking down the street or cars on the road. Signs of violence everywhere he turned.
The hospital where he served had no electricity or running water. The sanitary conditions were pathetic, and the medical equipment obsolete. Hospital rooms were overcrowded with mostly women and children missing limbs or suffering from very complex wounds resulting from the use of sophisticated weapons of warfare.
Six months after his first visit, Dr. Angora returned to Baghdad, and what he found was both encouraging and disheartening. While he saw a city with more life, people on the streets, cars on the road and businesses open, there were still blackouts and a lack of electricity and clean running water.
Since the end of major hostilities, Doctors of the World has not only been assisting Iraqi doctors in the treatment of patients but has helped rebuild the infrastructure of at least two hospitals, providing them with proper equipment. Those hospitals are now better-staffed and better-prepared to assist patients.
Although the Iraqis seem to be taking more control of security with their own forces, Dr. Angora saw a more dangerous city, with constant outbursts of gunfire. "Everyone," he said, "has a weapon to defend their families from delinquents."
There seems to be a clear separation between the common criminal out to steal and take advantage of the power vacuum and the so-called resistance fighters perpetrating attacks on coalition forces. It is perceived that the latter, Dr. Angora says, are mostly foreigners who have sneaked in to destabilize the country even more.
As destabilized as the situation in Iraq might be, speaking to Dr. Angora gave me the impression that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Even though it might get worse, with a growing power struggle among the different factions of Iraqi society, he feels that people are enjoying a sense of freedom that was not there under Saddam Hussein. The freedom to speak their mind, to practice their religion or even to have a satellite dish that connects them with the outside world.
That is what Iraq looks like these days through the eyes of a doctor. |
