Men sit at a traditional cafe in the historic city of Shaqlawah, about 48 kilometres northeast of Erbil, in the northern Iraqi Kurdish autonomous region. AFP
Iraqi authorities ordered medical students to deploy at the country’s hospitals as deaths from the coronavirus in the country spike.
The National Security Council made the decision, during a Saturday session chaired by Prime Minister Mustafa Al Kadhimi, state media said.
Fifth-and sixth-year medical students will be “directed to volunteer to work at hospitals” to support health staff “in the confrontation against the coronavirus pandemic,” the council said.
The latest official data on Saturday showed that 101 more people died from the coronavirus in Iraq, taking the death toll to 1,669. The total confirmed cases stand at 43,262.
But the pandemic is widely believed to have inflicted far more damage on the population than official figures suggest.
Responding to reports of oxygen-supply shortages, the Health Ministry said on Friday that its cylinder-refilling plant “is doubling its efforts to produce the largest volumes of oxygen to meet hospitals’ needs.”
Source: The National