The United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) says that the escalating violence in Iraq combined with a shortage of health workers is putting severe pressure on the health of the Iraqi population.
A release from the WHO relays concern that health services will not be able to help the millions of people who have been displaced.
The government estimates that almost 70 per cent of critically injured patients with violence-related wounds die while in the Emergency and Intensive Care Units due to a shortage of competent staff and a lack of drugs and equipment, WHO said in a news release published in conjunction with a conference in Geneva being organized by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to address the needs of the nearly 4 million uprooted Iraqis.