Sudan: Nowhere safe from violent fighting in El Fasher as hospitals are repeatedly hit

“We see a bloodbath unfolding before our own eyes in El Fasher. The intensity of the fighting is leaving civilians with no respite and now hospitals are being increasingly engulfed in the fighting, making it harder and harder to treat the wounded,” says Claire Nicolet, MSF programme manager for Sudan.

“Medical facilities should be protected and the warring parties should respect their neutral role as sanctuaries for the sick and wounded where people can safely receive medical assistance,” she says.

El Fasher’s South Hospital was first hit on 25 May, when a mortar landed on the ante-natal care unit killing one person and injuring eight among patients and their families. The next day a shell landed inside the hospital and injured three more people, while its fragments from the explosion broke the windows of the delivery room and of the ambulance. Three other shells landed outside the hospital.

“South Hospital is very congested: it is the only hospital capable of treating the mass arrivals of wounded people and has received over 1,000 patients since fighting began in the city on 10 May,” says Abdifatah Yusuf Ibrahim, project coordinator with MSF.