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http://www.jang.com.pk/thenews/nov2001-daily/17-11-2001/national/n4.htm
The News International
November 17, 2001-- Ramadan 01,1422 A.H
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Mounting concern over human cost of war in Afghanistan
QUETTA: Doctors and relief workers are voicing growing concerns that the
psychological impact of the war in Afghanistan is not being addressed as the
human cost mounts. There are no accurate figures on how many civilians have
been killed, wounded or maimed in Afghanistan since the US unleashed its
military might on October 7, but it undoubtedly runs into the hundreds,
perhaps thousands.
Millions more Afghans have been displaced, watched family members die or
their homes destroyed. Outside of Afghanistan, the most visible sign of the
human impact can be seen in this southwestern Pakistani city, close to the
border where the war-wounded and others who have run for their lives are
found.
Doctors at the city's main hospital, the Sandeman Provincial, treat new
cases every day and are now running out of a lack of supplies, particularly
the metal plates used to repair limbs crushed by falling walls. They
estimate they have seen at least 60 seriously injured people in the weeks
since the US started bombing. Quetta's other hospitals have treated similar
numbers, as has the basic medical facility at Chaman, on the border with
Afghanistan. Psychiatrists have also had to cope with a massive rise in
patient numbers. "A large number have post traumatic stress disorder," Dr.
Ghulam Rasool, consultant psychiatrist at the Bolam Medical College said.
Rasool is one of just five psychiatrists in Quetta and is seeing at least
100 patients a day, more than 60 percent of whom are traumatised Afghans.
And that, he says, is just the tip of the iceberg. "They are depressed and
anxious, they are irritable, have lost their appetite. There is a real
feeling of loss -- loss of body, loss of money, loss of friends and family,"
he said. "The psychological trauma is deep. Their basic needs have been
ignored. They feel insecure, have no stability and are suffering the effects
of war, deficiency of food."
Rasool, who is working 15 hours a day, said one of the main problems was
that refugees could not afford medicines. "If they are not treated, it will
become chronic stress disorder and even suicide," he said. Medicins Sans
Frontiers (MSF) team leader Aitor Zabalgogeazkoa said it was too early to
judge the long-term impact of the war on Afghan people. "Of course the
people who are running are very scared. They have seen the kind of horror
that many will never see," he said. "But in my experience only something
like five percent of people suffering the effects of violence like this need
long-term psychological assistance."
He also pointed to the fact that many Afghans were used to hardship with the
country wracked by war and drought for years. "Many are realistic enough to
face the situation and get on with it. They have a coping mechanism with
family and friends. They more or less assimilate it and it is very difficult
to judge how traumatised and affected they are."
While many may appear resigned to their fate, despair and grief is clearly
visible in the mushrooming communities of Afghans who have made it to
safety. It is rare to find an intact family. Refugees, often in tears,
recount how they have found sons shot dead by the Taliban and had sons and
husbands forcibly conscripted to fight a war they do not want to fight.
Scores more tell of homes destroyed by US bombs, children, husbands, wives,
mothers and fathers killed during the five-week long campaign to eliminate
Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda network.
And some of those affected by the US-led bombing campaign will never fully
recover, physically or psychologically. Sath Mohd, 11, will go through life
without his right leg, which was blown off when a bomb landed close to a
group of children playing near the southern city of Kandahar.
Twelve days after he was admitted to hospital in shock and caked in dried
blood and mud, he is struggling to come to terms with what has happened.
"Why me? What did I do to America? I was just playing. I don't know where my
friends are, where my mother is," he said. His grieving father, holding his
hand, asked: "What future does he have?"
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