Inside the last functioning hospital in Sudan’s Khartoum North

Away from the bustling corridors of Bahri Hospital, the only functioning hospital left in Sudan’s city of Khartoum North, Alsuna Issa sits perched on the edge of a small cot next to her toddler son in a patient room.

The young boy, Jaber, dressed in distressed jeans and a Spiderman t-shirt that grazes his enlarged belly, is malnourished.

Under the whirring fans of the hospital, patients in similar situations wait their turn, hoping to be attended to in a country reeling from more than 18 months of fighting between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

The only hospital left in Khartoum North

The hospital is in the northern part of the city, recently taken back from RSF control by the Sudanese army in late September – who had captured it in the early months of the war last year – in one of three cities that make up Sudan’s national capital region of Khartoum.

Due to the repeated targeting of healthcare facilities throughout Sudan’s conflict, it is the only hospital left in the city after more than 100 attacks on health facilities since April last year, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Issa brought her son Jaber to the hospital after he suffered fever and diarrhoea for days and she could not find a functioning hospital near her home.

“He has been vomiting and his stomach is distended. They tested him and found that he has malaria and a stomach infection … but there are no hospitals near me. So I brought him here and he was admitted,” the distraught young mother told Al Jazeera.

Doctors say hundreds of patients come in daily, including from RSF-held areas in the city, with needs ranging from surgeries to nutritional care for children.

But getting to this hospital is not easy.

“We live far away, getting back home is difficult. Sometimes, there is fighting or artillery shelling so we have to hide in the nearest house.

“Sometimes the hospital is too crowded so we have to come back the next day,” one patient, Iqbal Ali, told Al Jazeera.

Another patient, Karima Ikram Ahmed Adam, said, “When someone falls sick … they come carrying them in a wheelbarrow or on a donkey if possible.”

The deteriorating security situation has forced more than 11 million people from their homes, according to Sudan’s government.

This displacement has affected health workers, leading to a shortage of medical staff, and contributing to hospital closures.

‘People are just dying and dying’

According to Dr Hadeel Malik, Bahri Hospital‘s emergency health director, the availability of medical resources has also been critically low throughout the war.

“The issue of supplies has been a problem since the start of the conflict. That is still the case in areas under the control of the RSF. Sometimes, medical supplies disappear before reaching our hospitals,” Malik told Al Jazeera.

“We fear for the safety of our workers because the RSF has, in the past, detained health workers,” she added.

Mailk added that under the control of the RSF for the last year and a half, the health conditions in the area were “very, very poor” but the situation is much better now, even if still critical.

“What we encountered was a lot of devastation, severe destruction and major theft from all the health centres and facilities,” said Malik.

Malik has been part of a team that set up more than 23 health centres in Khartoum North in response over the past year.

For Adam, the patient at the hospital, having community support has been essential to compensate for inadequate healthcare.

“By God, if there is someone in our neighbourhood who is sick, everyone, the people, and the neighbours, come together and support each other,” she said.

“You can’t manage unless the whole neighbourhood comes together because … the situation is critical.”

Adam urged the international community to send aid amid the country’s dire situation.

“People are just dying and dying, and there has been no aid reaching us until now,” she said.

“So, I’m pleading for aid to reach us, for medicines to reach us, because the number of sick children is overwhelming.”