IN CONVERSATION WITH CLAIRE HA-DUONG
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The sound of crying and beeping medical devices fills the small room. Nurses rush from bed to bed, checking vital signs. Mothers push oxygen masks onto the faces of their children. The emergency room doctor bursts through the swinging doors as the demand for paediatric care in Afghanistan continues to stretch staff and resources to their limits in Boost Hospital in Helmand.
“I have 17 patients waiting to be admitted, but nowhere to put them,” says Dr Ahmed*, an MSF emergency room doctor. It’s 6 pm, and the night shift has only just begun. Every bed in the paediatric department is full; they are often shared by two patients, and the next wave of patients is already arriving.
“This is a crazy time for us. Day by day, more and more patients are coming,” says Dr Ahmed.
The number of children under five coming to the ER triage at Boost Hospital has more than doubled since 2020, rising from 53,923 to 122,335 patients in 2024. In April of this year, 13,738 children under five were seen in the ER at Boost Hospital – the highest monthly number of ER consultations since at least 2020.
Finding the space, time and resources to treat the growing number of children is a challenge. They arrive with life-threatening conditions like sepsis, respiratory failure, and severe malnutrition.
This increase in paediatric patients is not just happening in Helmand, though. Health facilities are facing similar pressures elsewhere in Afghanistan, including the Mazar-i-Sharif Regional Hospital in Balkh Province and the Herat Regional Hospital in Herat.
“Families are struggling to get the healthcare they need. Many health facilities at all levels struggle with insufficient staffing and a lack of basic medications and diagnostic equipment,” says Julie Paquereau, a medical coordinator with MSF in Afghanistan.
This was already the situation before US foreign aid was halted earlier this year, and over US$1 billion in funding was cancelled for US Agency for International Development (USAID) projects in Afghanistan, according to an estimate by the U.S. Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction.
“I have 17 patients waiting to be admitted, but nowhere to put them,” says Dr Ahmed*, an MSF emergency room doctor. It’s 6 pm, and the night shift has only just begun. Every bed in the paediatric department is full; they are often shared by two patients, and the next wave of patients is already arriving.
“This is a crazy time for us. Day by day, more and more patients are coming,” says Dr Ahmed.
The number of children under five coming to the ER triage at Boost Hospital has more than doubled since 2020, rising from 53,923 to 122,335 patients in 2024. In April of this year, 13,738 children under five were seen in the ER at Boost Hospital – the highest monthly number of ER consultations since at least 2020.
Finding the space, time and resources to treat the growing number of children is a challenge. They arrive with life-threatening conditions like sepsis, respiratory failure, and severe malnutrition.
This increase in paediatric patients is not just happening in Helmand, though. Health facilities are facing similar pressures elsewhere in Afghanistan, including the Mazar-i-Sharif Regional Hospital in Balkh Province and the Herat Regional Hospital in Herat.
“Families are struggling to get the healthcare they need. Many health facilities at all levels struggle with insufficient staffing and a lack of basic medications and diagnostic equipment,” says Julie Paquereau, a medical coordinator with MSF in Afghanistan.
This was already the situation before US foreign aid was halted earlier this year, and over US$1 billion in funding was cancelled for US Agency for International Development (USAID) projects in Afghanistan, according to an estimate by the U.S. Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction.