When London doctors Rola Hallam and Saleyha Ahsan travelled to Syria to work with the Hand in Hand for Syria charity, nothing could have prepared them for the terrible emergency that unfolded in front of them.
An incendiary attack on a school left 10 children dead and more than 40 horribly burned, all descending on their makeshift hospital in Aleppo with few staff and inadequate facilities.
The scenes were filmed by the BBC’s Panorama program in a report to be screened on tonight’s Dateline at 9.30pm on SBS ONE.
“I’m improvising in ways that I‘ve never been forced to do because of lack of equipment,” says Saleyha as they battle with the terrible injuries.
“They will need intensive care therapy basically, which we are not able to provide in the context of a field hospital,” explains Rola, as ambulances are found to take some of them to safety in Turkey.
Rola lived in Syria as a child and each time she returns, the country is more dangerous and more devastated.
She can’t contain her anger about the school attack, which came shortly after the chemical attack on Damascus.
“The whole world has failed our nation and it’s innocent civilians who are paying the price,” she says.
“Out of all the war zones that I've ever been to, today has been by the worst,” says Saleyha after the panic has died down.
“The fact that they were children - they were children - teenagers, same ages as my nieces and nephews.”
See this confronting story on tonight’s Dateline at 9.30pm on SBS ONE, and read more now on the Dateline website.
