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An
explosive Congressional investigation revealed horrific new details this week
about a U.S. funded military hospital in Afghanistan that kept patients in
"Auschwitz-like" conditions.
The
investigation also revealed that Lt. General William B. Caldwell, then
commander of the $11.2 billion dollar a year Afghan training program, tried to
block the probe and ordered a cover-up.
There
are currently two on-going investigations looking into the Dawood Military
Hospital abuses: one centred around the Military Whistle-blower Protection Act,
the other concerned with Caldwell’s politically-motivated decision to delay
investigations into the hospital until after the 2010 elections.
What
follows is a very disturbing look inside the Dawood National Military Hospital.
It was compiled with sworn eye-witness testimony from the three U.S. Army
colonels who blew the whistle on the scandal, as well as never-before published
photos obtained by BuzzFeed.
The
photos and corresponding descriptions were collected by U.S. military personnel
in Afghanistan.
The
images are extremely graphic.
Colonel
Gerald Nicholas Carozza: "Patients were lying in filth, in some cases
starving and with grotesque bed sores. One patient was on the brink of starving
to death."
 |
| A patient's untreated wound |
"The
Patients’ Bill of Rights posters were found ripped off the walls lying on the
ground torn to pieces 'to allow for painting of the walls.’"
Image: This
patient was not treated for three days, given no wound checks, and his
dressings were soiled. He was not given any analgesics prior to his surgery,
and remained conscious. U.S. military personnel in Afghanistan at the time
described his surgery taking place in "semi-sterile conditions." This
patient died 4 days later of peritonitis related sepsis without ever going back
to operating room for care.
 |
Maggots began falling out of this patient's wounds. He died a week later.
|
Colonel Schuyler K. Geller: "Afghan soldiers’ families have sold their farms and indentured themselves for healthcare in the US- and coalition-supported Dawood Khan Hospital."
Gangrene
set in, making this patient a candidate for amputation. The surgeon refused to
"address the issue for days," according to the investigation.
Investigators
described this as "a sacral decubitus lesion with high grade tunnelling."
There were no plans for surgery for this patient.
Colonel
Mark Fassl: "Open baths of blood draining out of soldiers' wounds, the faeces
on the floor."
All
testimony was filmed at Tuesday's House Oversight Committee hearing.
"External
Fixation device. Bandages unattended for > 1 week, soiled, malodorous. Wound
management team summoned on insistence of mentor(s). Maggots found among purulent
draining fixation sites."
Col.
Fassl: "How could we be allowing this type of suffering to go on?"
Col.
Geller: "Today, not just in 2010 or 2011, individuals...who
perpetrated...unspeakable abuses upon Afghan soldiers, civilians and family
members walk the halls of the Dawood Khan hospital unrepentant, unscathed,
enriched, and still unprosecuted."
Image: Necrotic
non-viable extremity, no clear management plan for this extremity. Purulent
material actively draining from external fixation site(s): no clear plan for empiric
or target Abx therapy, no cultures, no antibiotics.
Rep.
John Tierney: "How many people went through that hospital and saw those
conditions and said nothing?"
Image: Drain
insertion through and through sinus track. No pre-procedure pain Rx,
non-sterile technique done in 'wound care room.
Col.
Carozza: "The evidence is clear to me that this was politics with a small
personal career driven politics."
Image: Beginning
stage of pressure ulceration.
Col.
Geller: "When Col Pagel, accompanied by a young USMC Capt. attorney, asked
me if there was any reason to believe LTG Caldwell delayed the investigations
into the NMH I replied: 'Any reason to believe? I know it for a fact.’"
Col.
Carozza: "Lt. Gen. Caldwell screamed at these three officers, waving his
finger at them for trying to bring in the DOD IG." Caldwell responded:
"There is nothing wrong in this command that we can't fix ourselves."
Col.
Carozza: "General Caldwell had the request withdrawn and postponed until
after the election and then, after the election, tried to intimidate his
subordinates into a consensus that it need not move forward at all."
"How
could we make this request with elections coming?" Caldwell reportedly
said, referring to President Obama. "He calls me Bill."
Throughout
the scandal and ensuing cover-up, the majority of the Dawood hospital staff has
remained in place.
Caldwell
is now running the U.S. Army North Command and is the senior commander of
Texas’ Fort Sam Houston.
Of
the above photos of patients, only 3 have been previously published. U.S.
military personnel in Afghanistan have submitted approximately 70 photos of the
abuses for investigation.
Links
to Statements from the House Oversight Committee Hearing
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