Libya has described the potential of a “total collapse” of its healthcare system as the chaos plaguing the country threatens to send many of the Philippine and Indian staff on whom its hospitals depend into flight.
Fighting between rival militias in Tripoli over the past three weeks and bloody clashes between extremists and army special forces in the eastern city of Benghazi have prompted several countries to evacuate their nationals and diplomatic staff.
Now, 3,000 health workers from the Philippines, making up 60 percent of Libya’s hospital staff, could leave — along with workers from India, who account for 20 percent.
Photo: AFP
Meanwhile, Libyan hospitals are flooded with a wave of admissions, victims of the fighting which has shaken the capital and Benghazi.
In Tripoli, at least 102 people have been killed and 452 wounded in the clashes that began on July 13, Libya’s Ministry of Health said on Wednesday.
It said 77 people have been killed and 289 wounded in Benghazi.
Manila already urged its citizens in Libya to leave on July 20, after a kidnapped Filipino worker was found beheaded.
Of the estimated 13,000 Filipinos in Libya, only about 700 heeded the warning and left. The rest refused to abandon their jobs, despite the dangers.
However, Manila said on Thursday that it would charter ferries to evacuate its nationals, a day after a Filipina nurse was kidnapped and gang raped in Tripoli.
Hundreds of Philippine doctors and nurses in Tripoli’s Medical Center walked out in protest at the savage attack on their colleague, unleashing anarchy in the hospital.
Families were forced to transfer sick relatives to private clinics, a hospital official said.
“Hospitals could be paralyzed” in the event of the mass departure of Philippine nationals, a health ministry spokesman said.
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