Artsakh Hospital Low on Supplies as Humanitarian Crisis Worsens
The Lachin Corridor—the only road connecting Artsakh to Armenia—remained closed on Monday for the 15th day, despite claims by Russian peacekeepers who told local residents on Saturday that the road would reopen on Monday without Azerbaijani checkpoints.
Hunan Tadevosyan, Artsakh’s interior ministry spokesman told Armenpress on Monday that the road remained closed.
Tigran Petrosyan, who has been leading marches of fed-up Artsakh residents to the Russian peacekeepers checkpoint since Friday said the promises made to them on Saturday were not kept.
He said they were waiting for some kind of resolution from an informal summit of CIS leaders in St. Petersburg, being attended by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitri Peskov on Monday reiterated that while the Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders were attending the summit, a meeting between them was not scheduled.
The 15-day-old blockade is having its ripple effects on every-day life in Artsakh, with health official reporting a severe shortage of medicine.
Artsakh’s health ministry said that there are 10 children in the intensive care and neonatal units of the Arevik Children’s Hospital in Stepanakert, while the Stepanakert Hospital is reporting that an additional 10 patients were in that facility’s intensive care unit, with four of them in critical condition.
Biayna Sukhudian, a pediatric neuropathologist from Armenia stranded in Stepanakert, told Azatutyun.am that the situation there was “critical.”
“There is a shortage of some painkillers and antibiotics, and some hormonal medications, which are badly needed in acute situations, have run out,” she said.
Sukhudian also expressed serious concern at a lack of special drugs for 87 Karabakh children who suffer from epilepsy and receive the medication from Arevik. “Sooner or later we will have cases of such children admitted to the hospital with seizures,” she said.
Sukhudian, who is a physician from the Arabkir Medical Center in Yerevan, was on a routine visit to Artsakh to provide medical assistance and has not be able to return because of the blockade.
The International Committee of the Red Cross mediated the transfer of a four-month-old baby suffering from a rare deadly disease, from Artsakh to Armenia. According to Azatutyun.am the baby boy was taken to the Muratsan University Clinic for children in Yerevan. A senior doctor there on Monday described the child’s condition as “serious but stable.”
An ICRC truck was also allowed to ship about 10 tons of baby food, drugs and other medical supplies to Karabakh at the weekend. According to a Red Cross spokeswoman in Stepanakert, the ICRC also evacuated from Karabakh four “foreign nationals” in need of urgent medical aid.
However, the ICRC’s spokesperson told Azatutyun.am that there is no new arrangement for the organization to transport food, medicine and other basic necessities to Artsakh.
The food shortage has also forced Artsakh authorities to ration certain types of food and necessities, with stores running out of basic stuff, especially food for children.
Local authorities are saying that shortages of flour, oil and other basic goods have forced a rationing, with residents being asked to use special coupons.
