Ukrainian hospitals are functioning “very badly” because they lack “surgical equipment, blood, infusion products, antibiotics”, reports anesthesiologist-resuscitator Raphaël Pitti on Tuesday April 19 on franceinfo. He spent four days in Lviv, Ukraine, doing scouting to set up a war medicine training center.
franceinfo: You are going to open a war medicine training center in Ukraine, as you did in Syria. Are these the same injuries?
Dr. Raphael Pitti: Absolutely. War, wherever it is, brings this type of pathologies that are specific to war or, more broadly, to disasters. In addition, there is the use of a number of weapons, both napalm, phosphorus, chemicals. It is really important to set up a course, as we did in Syria, on the management of chemical injuries because I am convinced that the Russians will use chemical weapons, especially in Mariupol because the fighters are diffused in the city, in the industrial zone. They are hidden so it will be extremely difficult to get them out. Only the chemical will be able to do it and the Russians have already done it.
How are hospitals working in Ukraine right now?
Very bad. They are required to work in a degraded situation. They end up running out of surgical equipment, blood, infusion products, antibiotics. These are situations that have been experienced in Aleppo and La Ghouta in Syria, with 2,000 to 3,500 injured, serious burns, impossible to evacuate them because there is no humanitarian corridor to do so. This is a situation where the death toll does not stop. Absolute emergencies become outdated emergencies.
“Our colleagues are themselves in danger because their structure can be bombed at any time.”
Dr Raphael Pittiat franceinfo
Without a humanitarian corridor, civilians are under terrible stress. They are hidden in the cellars. They are grounded. There is no water or no electricity, or very little, and above all no food. This is the method used by the Russians in Syria or Chechnya.
What do you think of the Western response vis-à-vis Russia since the beginning of this war?
There is a Western cowardice in not going to the end of their convictions. This is not just a war between Ukraine and Putin, it really is a war of civilization. There are two conceptions in the world: the democratic conception with respect for human dignity and respect for human rights and on the other side there are authoritarian systems which crush the individual, which crush society . In Syria, that’s what Vladimir Putin did by keeping Bashar al-Assad in power. We have to fight Vladimir Putin wherever he is because they are two totally different concepts of civilization. We have to defend our values and our civilization.