Iraq's cancer children overlooked in war

With Iraq's hospitals in disarray, the long-term sick are being passed over in a frantic effort to treat emergency cases. For the thousands of young leukaemia victims, the outlook is bleaker than ever.

There are countless children ahead of Munther in the queue for medical help in Iraq.

The seven-year-old is not suffering from one of the conditions associated with the war, such as gastroenteritis, pneumonia or shrapnel wounds. He has acute lymphatic anaemia, also known as leukaemia.

It is a deadly disease - a cancer of the white blood cells - and if Munther is not treated he will die but the war has dealt a potentially fatal blow to the young boy, from Nasiriyah, in southern Iraq.

Munther has been unable to travel the 230 miles to Baghdad for his monthly treatment session at a specialist cancer care hospital, where he receives chemotherapy drugs injected into the spine and intravenously.

Safety has been a concern for Munther's father, Yahia al-Abbas, who has always gone with his son on trips to the capital. While there is still lawlessness, Mr Abbas is reluctant to venture far from home, although he believes the security situation is starting to ease.

More critical is that the hospital in Baghdad which looks after Munther was pillaged by looters in the wake of the fighting and is today barely functioning. Also, supplies of some cancer-treatment drugs have run out in recent weeks as Iraqi border controls have tightened and distribution networks have seized up.

Munther's medicine dried up a week ago and no-one knows if, or when, new supplies will be available.

"I've been to the American [military] hospital in Nasiriyah and the Red Cross for help but they only handle first aid and they can't do anything," says Mr Abbas.

"My son's in bad health at the moment. He has vomiting, fever, anaemia and a suppressed immunity.

"I'm praying that the Americans and British and other countries will help Iraq's sufferers of chronic disease. My worry is that my son could die because of what happened. Because of this, I see a dark future for my family."

It's a story that is being repeated across Iraq, as cancer sufferers and others who are critically ill and in need of regular treatment, are passed over in the post-war rush to treat medical emergencies.

"We're doing all we can just to concentrate on infections and some curable diseases"

Dr Abdul Ghaffar Al-Shadood

"People come up to me many times a day asking for cancer drugs," says Dr Mary McLoughlin, based in Nasiriyah with the humanitarian agency Goal. "I'm aware that many of these people will die because the emphasis at the moment is on primary healthcare."

Leukaemia, which affects blood and bone marrow, used to be relatively rare in Iraq. According to the former health ministry, cases of the cancer increased fourfold after the first Gulf War and many have blamed the use of depleted uranium munitions used by the allied forces in that conflict.