- By Tom Bateman
- BBC News, Adana, southern Turkey
This six-month-old lady – whose face is terribly bruised – in understood just as “confidential” by her tag
The injured kids in Adana City Hospital are too young to understand just how much they have actually lost.
I viewed physicians in the extensive care system bottle-feed a hurt six-month-old lady whose moms and dads can’t be discovered.
There are hundreds more cases of unknown kids whose moms and dads are dead or untraceable.
The earthquake broke their houses and now it has actually removed their names.
Dr Nursah Keskin grips the hand of the infant lady in extensive care – understood just by the tag on her bed: “Anonymous”.
She has several fractures, a shiner and her face is terribly bruised; however she turns and smiles at us.
“We understand where she was discovered and how she got here. But we’re looking for an address. The search is continuing,” says Dr Keskin, a paediatrician and deputy director at the medical facility.
This little lady – thought to be aged 5 or 6 – has a head injury and several fractures
Many of these cases are kids rescued from collapsed structures in other areas. They were given Adana since the medical facility is still standing.
Many other medical centres in the catastrophe zone have actually fallen or are harmed. Adana ended up being a rescue center.
In one transfer, newborns were hurried here from a maternity ward in a badly-hit medical facility in the city of Iskenderun.
Turkish health authorities state throughout the nation’s catastrophe zone there are presently more than 260 injured kids who they have actually not had the ability to determine.
That figure might increase considerably as more locations are reached and the scale of homelessness totally emerges.
Dr Ilknur Banlicesur, a paediatric cosmetic surgeon, says numerous kids cannot talk since of the shock
I follow Dr Keskin through the jam-packed passages. Earthquake survivors push trolleys, others are covered in blankets on bed mattress in an emergency situation location. We head towards the surgical treatment ward, likewise filled with hurt kids.
We satisfy a lady the physicians state is 5 or 6 years of ages. She’s sleeping and connected to intravenous drips. The staff state she has a head injury and several fractures.
I ask if she has actually had the ability to inform them her name.
“No, it’s just eye-contact and gestures,” says Dr Ilknur Banlicesur, a paediatric cosmetic surgeon.
“Because of the shock, these kids cannot actually talk. They understand their names. Once they’re stabilised a number of days later on we can [try to] talk,” she describes.
Health authorities have actually been attempting to match unknown kids to addresses. But frequently the addresses are absolutely nothing more than ruins. In a minimum of 100 cases, anonymous kids have actually already been taken into care.
Turkish social networks has actually been filled with posts revealing missing kids, offering information of which flooring they resided on in collapsed structures, revealing hope they might have been rescued and required to medical facility.
Surviving family members and health ministry authorities have actually been taking a trip in between medical centres looking for them.
In the Adana medical facility, the injured keep coming. They are shocked and tired.
Everyone here is a survivor, clients and medics alike.
Dr Keskin lost family members to the earthquake and protected in the medical facility with her kids as aftershocks struck.
I ask her how she is coping.
“I’m good, I’m attempting to be good, since [the children] actually require us.
“But I state thank God, I still have my kids. I can’t think about a larger discomfort for a mom than losing her kid.”
Next to us, young clients in wards await their moms and dads to come back.
Some have actually been reunited. But the rest stay the earthquake’s confidential kids.
Watch: Earthquake saves deal hope in Turkey and Syria
