About 12.2 million people in Syria need health services. The crisis in Syria left most health care facilities paralyzed. Facilities are old or were severely damaged during the crisis. Many people cannot get essential health care. Access to health care is further limited because of the cost of going to the hospital.

Families have to rent a car to get to a hospital in another city, often financially crippling for vulnerable and low-income families. During an emergency, often a person will be driven to the hospital because an ambulance will take hours and not arrive in time to save the patient.

In one of the visits to a hospital in Deir-ez-Zor where Medair was planning an intervention, the communications team met Mohammad. Mohammad had a bag of blood under his armpit. We approached him and asked him about his story.

“My son suffers from thalassemia. The medication needed for his condition is not available at the hospital, and I cannot afford it. Every twenty days we need to come to the hospital to get the blood bag. There are no heating devices available here to increase the blood temperature. I need to carry it about five hours under my armpit before I can give it to my son.”

“I wish I can find an easier solution, but everything is expensive, and it’s impossible for me to ever afford a bone marrow transplant for him, so we must come every twenty days for the blood. I’m thankful the blood at least is available” Mohammad said.