Tripoli hospital struggling as bodies keep coming
Alex Thomson
Chief Correspondent
Alex is Thomson says that bodies piling up in Tripoli’s Al Zawiya Hospital the day after Gaddafi’s Bab al-Aziziya compound was stormed by rebels.
This video contains distressing images
At Tripoli’s main Al Zawiya Hospital, everything is overwhelmed by incoming casualties – not least the mortuary. I stopped counting after 37 bodies – all in civilian clothing – strewn about the corridors and room which were never meant for this purpose. Almost all the bodies I examined appeared to have died from gunshot wounds. Officials here have confirmed most were killed by snipers in the past two days. One said at least 400 people had been killed.
The refrigerated lockers designed to accommodate human bodies are, of course, all full. The floor space of the mortuary itself, taken up with yet more bodies of both sexes and all ages. The stench of human decomposition is overwhelming, as relatives come here, clutching cloths over their faces against the smell, trying to identify who those people are.
The main entrance of the hospital is equally overwhelmed as injured people arrive from cars, taxis and ambulances into a hastily arranged triage unit. Every now and then a coffin exits in the other direction, in the green, black and red of revolutionary Libya.
One of the doctors examines a young man with a fractured right leg from a bullet and says:
“There is a double problem here. We do not have enough anaesthetic to operate. But also, we do not have enough staff. So many of them are still too frightened to come to work at the hospital.”
All around this city, at checkpoints and borders, are people ramming their Kalashnikovs into posters lying in the tarmac of Colonel Gaddafi. Drivers pass by and do wheel spins on the posters to add their own insult. On one corner, armed rebels are stamping and spitting on copies of Gaddafi’s Green Book. People’s desires to vent their anger after 42 years of Gaddafi control is palpable – the foreign journalists in this city are greeted with nothing but joy and welcome and the shouts of course are Allahu Akbar, God is great.
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