INCREASED CANCERS

The cancer rate in Iraq has skyrocketed since the Gulf war. Most researchers now link this to the vast quantities of Depleted Uranium ammunition that the US and UK fired. The US and UK continue to deny that such a link exists. Whatever the cause, the US dominated Sanctions Committee has repeatedly withheld or deliberately delayed cancer treatments from entering Iraq. So poor was the consistency of the supply line that the former UN Humanitarian Aid Co-ordinator for Iraq, Denis Halliday, had himself to personally break sanctions to bring in sufficient medicine to treat two children suffering from leukaemia. Both survived; without his actions they would not have.

Cancer rates appear to be clustered around the areas where most DU was fired. It is particularly prevalent in the South of the country, where the increase is between 400% and 1000%. Most Iraqi doctors now consider it an epidemic, and with so few drugs consistently available, the majority of hospitals record a recovery rate of zero.

These photos were taken
by

Professor Siegwart-Horst Gunther (1993 - 1998) - Copyright free [SHG]
Used with kind permission

Karen Robinson (1999) - [KR]

Robinson, a professional photographer, has graciously allowed use of her material on this site.
Those wishing to re-use or reprint her photographs in any other format, site and/or hard copy publications,
please contact her c/o cb@spannerfilms.net

Additional photos and video captures
by
Grant Wakefield (1999) - Copyright free [GW]

	Child with leukaemia, Al Khadimir Hospital, Baghdad, April 1999 [GW]
Child with leukaemia [SHG]
	Noora Talibi, 3rd relapse of acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia. Al Monseur Teaching Hospital, Baghdad, December 1996. (Noora died in March 1997) [Photo courtesy Chuck Quilty / Voices in the Wilderness US]
Child with leukaemia [KR]
	Child with unspecified cancer [KR]
Child in an advanced stage of leukaemia. The shroud is being used to keep flies off him as all the window screens are broken. There was no air conditioning due to broken machines and lack of spare parts. Summer temperatures reach 40 degrees centigrade. Saddam Central Teaching Hospital, Baghdad, April 1999 [GW]
	According to the doctors we spoke to, there hadn't been bedsheets in this hospital for two years. [GW]
[GW]

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