Syria: Hospitals Hit Repeatedly by Russian and Syrian Airstrikes

Four of the last eight functional hospitals and a blood bank in eastern Aleppo, Syria, were damaged by bombing in the past four days. One hospital was bombed twice.

On September 30, two hospitals in eastern Aleppo supported by Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), among other groups, were damaged by continuous indiscriminate bombing. A blood bank was also damaged. Despite the attacks, medical teams at the three facilities managed to continue their work.

On October 1, a major trauma hospital was so severely damaged by bombing that it was forced to close. Two days later, as construction teams worked to repair the building, the area was bombed a second time, killing a number of people and further damaging the hospital.  

On October 2, a surgical hospital was damaged by bombing, but remained open.

"The few remaining hospitals are collapsing under a flow of hundreds of wounded lying in agony on the floors of wards and corridors," said Pablo Marco, MSF’s operations manager in the Middle East. "Doctors are performing brain and abdominal surgeries on the victims of bombing on the floors of the emergency rooms, for lack of available operating theaters. Russia and Syria must stop this carnage now."

MSF supports eight hospitals in Aleppo city. It runs six medical facilities across northern Syria and supports more than 150 health centers and hospitals across the country, many of them in besieged areas.

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