Medical Care In Afghanistan

Medical Care In Afghanistan BY: LOGAN COMBS

Lack of normal medical supplies like vaccines or antibiodics to prevent or cure diseases. • "Medevac services that service the world usually will not come to Afghanistan unless you have insurance"(http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1056.html) for this and many do not have the option to have insurance in Afghanistan. • Not only is their shortages of supplies there is also a lot of shortages of trained doctors. • The hospitals in Afghanistan are nothing like ones in the United States, in fact there are only about 2 hospitals in Kabul and both have only one or two doctors in them. Conditions for doctors

In Afghanistan there is not a lot of supplies therefore there is not a lot of shots for numbing or putting patients to sleep.This means just to have a chance to live patients have to go through severe pain in surgery without any numbing devices. After surgeries hospitals don't have the right supplies to clean the wound from surgery so if you live through surgery you have a high chance of infection after. • An example of this that was shown on CBS news was that "observers in the U.S. military noticed that Afghan soldiers at Dawood National Military Hospital died of infections "(Attkisson) and some from possible starving to death. This is what comes from the lack of supplies and food. As you see on the pictures there was neglect of the patient and no proper treatment. • This patient is definently not the only one who has gone through something like this due to Afghanistan's poor medical conditions. There are people all over Afghanistan treated just like this. Conditions for Patients

As I said earlier in the presentation there is lack of necesities that are basic and this is in the capital of Afghanistan imagine the smaller parts. • Not only is there lack of medicines, there is lack of doctors and insurance for the patients. • As you can see the United States in 1987 was at the life expectancy of about 76 years and In 1987 Afghanistan was at about 41 years of life expectancy. Availibilty of medicines

Why is the United States so much higher in life expectancy you ask? • Well it is simply because the Unites States is educated in how to work with the medicines and has the medicines needed for care, however Afghanistan does not have the education nor the supplies to be able to cure or prevent the diseases the The United States can. Availibility of medicines continued..

The Taliban prevented women to be cared for even in a life threatening state. Even with the Taliban losing some control in 2002 men of Afghanistan will not allow women to be cared for at a hospital with male staff. They will only care for men. Afghan militiamen serving with the U.S.-led antiterrorism group still won't even allow mothers to visit their hospitalized children, only fathers. The taliban, while they were in charge wouldn't allow most women to go to school therefore there were hardly any women doctors and women were not allowed to see men doctors. • However, men during the rule of the Taliban were allowed to be hospitalized anytime at any place and seen by any doctor. Women vs. Men

Women in Afghanistan "die every 30 seconds from childbirth"(Qazi). • Only about "30% of women in Afghanistan can attend school"(Qazi). • And more than 80% of Afghan women don't know how to read or write. • These facts are important because if in some parts of Afghanistan women are not allowed to be seen by men doctors and 80% "of women are illeterate"(Qazi) than there is not a lot of women doctors therefore not a lot of women have a possibility to be treated correctly or fairly compared to men. • Compared to the women of Afghanistan men don't have these terrible facts or this lack of education. • Men are able to be seen by little doctors they have , however they have a chance even with the lack of supplies but women do not in most of Afghanistan. women vs. men continued...

Like women and men there is a big difference in the health conditions for rich and poor people in Afghanistan. • The best hospitals are in the urban areas of Afghanistan,for example Kabul. Therefore the hospitals require a high cost to get into and the poor people on the streets in the urban areas or the people barely making it by are not going to be able to get into the hospital. • However if a wealthy person needed to get into the hospital they could just walk right in, offer their money, and be treated that simply just because of their money. Wealthy vs. poor

Well why don't the poor just get a job? • My answer to that question is they simply cannot get a job in most parts of Afghanistan because of many reasons • If you are a single women without the education, How are you supposed to get a well paying job? • Insurance is offered however it is not a strong and reliable insurance like America has. And only the wealthy people can afford the insurance or medevac so the poor people are very lucky if they are seen by a doctor or nurse. Wealthy vs. poor continued...

The best known and best facilitated hospitals are located in urban areas especially Kabul, Afghanistan. • But as I said earlier only wealthy people can afford to attend these hospitals. • In rural areas Afghanistan doesn't have many hospitals the rural areas have what are called medical facilities that are smaller than hospitals and less advanced. Urban vs. rural

Yes the medical facilities are cheaper, however the only reason they are cheaper are because of the lack of doctors and supplies . • Poor people don't benefit from either one of these situations because they can't afford the urban hospitals and the medical facilities don't have the proper things to prevent disease or cure it. Urban vs rural

Medical Care In Afghanistan