OMDURMAN, Sudan — A year and a half of war in Sudan has led to a humanitarian catastrophe in one of Africa’s largest countries. Up to 150,000 people have been killed, according to some estimates. The fighting has displaced 12 million people, according to the United Nations, which calls it the “largest displacement crisis in the world.” And medical services in much of Sudan have collapsed.
NPR spent three days reporting from one hospital in Omdurman, a city in Sudan’s capital region, to see the toll facing hospitals and medical staff.
Fifty-two-year-old Dr. Jamal Mohamed is an orthopedic surgeon and the director general of Al Nao hospital in Omdurman.
Before the war, he lived in Khartoum, Sudan's capital, with his family. But when the fighting began April 2023, his wife and children fled to Egypt, while he stayed behind.
When Khartoum was taken by the Sudanese paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, in the early months of the war last year, Mohamed fled to Omdurman, which is controlled by the Sudanese army. Then he joined Al Nao Hospital, working as a volunteer, and became its director.
Like all the medical staff there, he hasn’t been paid a salary since the war began, only small monthly stipends.
There used to be dozens of medical centers in Omdurman before the war. Most have been forced to shut down because of a lack of supplies, staff or funding, or because they’ve been destroyed by the fighting. Now there’s just seven and Al Nao is one of the largest still functioning.
The RSF controls large parts of Khartoum, just across the river Nile. The Sudanese army has made gains there, in renewed fighting over the last week, and it also controls most of Omdurman.
Virtually every day, the army launches airstrikes into Khartoum. The RSF constantly shells Omdurman, destroying homes, schools and hospitals.
Al Nao hospital has been shelled at least five times, according to Mohamed. He says the hospital has been deliberately targeted, which would constitute a war crime.
The day before NPR’s team arrived, it was shelled by the RSF, according to the hospital. While the team was there, the surrounding area was also shelled repeatedly.
One day, 20 people were rushed into the hospital emergency ward. Two of the casualties were pronounced dead when they arrived.
Medical staff fought to save a young man who was brought in unconscious. They administered CPR for several minutes before he died.
Every day unidentified victims who died at the hospital are brought to a morgue.
Their pictures are taken and posted on social media, in the hope of reaching their families. But most of the time, no one claims them and they are buried in unmarked graves near the hospital.
Some of the victims treated at the hospital now live and work there too, like Farata Jadeen, who lived nearby in Omdurman. In June last year, RSF fighters arrested him, accusing him of being affiliated with the army. They shot him in the face with a rifle, from behind his jaw, with the bullet piercing out from his nose. After almost four months of treatment at Al Nao, he survived.
But by the time he was well enough to leave, his house was destroyed by the fighting.
Now he lives at Al Nao hospital, where he works as a cleaner. “Thanks be to God that I’m alive,” he said.
Ammar Awad contributed reporting in Omdurman, Sudan.
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