.@AlexCrawfordSky has been inside a hospital in Afghanistan’s poorest province Badghis as a humanitarian disaster unfolds.
Every day children are brought in malnourished to this hospital controlled by the Taliban, where medicine is in short supply and plug sockets don’t work
In one ward there were four babies crammed on a single bed. Another was held in his mother’s arms nearby with no space available to lay him down and yet another was being looked after by his mother on the floor. They are all the victims of a huge measles outbreak in the district
In the maternity ward there’s a terrified looking teenager called Asiya who’s about to give birth.
Her family sold her into marriage for 5000-dollars, an above average price. But now she’s frightened and in pain.
‘I’m nervous I’m going to die,’ she says in a quiet voice.
The new Director of Public Health for the area is Mohammad Asif Qanit, who during the occupation was planting explosive devices to blow up foreign troop convoys.
He insists he’s adequately qualified to do the job after ‘about one to two months’ training in health issues.
When the Taliban took back control, about half of the health workers in the main hospital just upped and left.
Those remaining have been hit by a lack of cash in the country. It’s meant essential medicines are in short supply, the hospital is grubby and the staff are demoralised
Rizamah is in hospital with her last surviving child, seven-month-old Khadija.
Khadija starts coughing and a nebuliser is called for. The first socket the nurse plugs it into doesn’t work & she has to search for one that does.
Later that night we’re told Khadija didn’t make it
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