Three-year-old Sayed Mansour Abou Warda is one of the many children suffering from the white phosphorus attacks. (Inset) Sabah Abou Halimah, a burn victim who also lost her husband and children.FOR the victims of white phosphorus attacks, the horrific burns are just the beginning of their problems.
If past experiences are to be taken into account, those hit by the deadly chemical can expect to develop cancer within a year of the attack.
Al-Sifa Hospital Burn Unit surgeon Dr Aladdin Ali said white phosphorus burns are different and worse from those incurred in normal fires.
"Victims feel not only the burning sensation, but an unbearable itch, too.
"The burns cover a huge area of the body, eat up the flesh and sink down to the bone.
"It also affects other organs like the kidneys, and interferes with many bodily functions."
In normal burns, he said, bacterial infection usually sets in after more than a week. With white phosphorus, however, these kind of infections set in within a few days.
"From the past experience of doctors in Afghanistan and Lebanon, we found that victims develop cancer on the burn areas within 10 months of the attack."
Dr Ali said the 10 doctors in the burn unit had to work round-the-clock for 23 days in order to cope with the massive number of people with white phosphorus burns.
"I've lost count of the number of victims we saw. At that time, we were experiencing a severe shortage of equipment and medicine.
"Thank God with the ceasefire, we have had a chance to replenish our supplies."
