By Heather Moore
CAIRO: In a small courtyard outside the National Council for the Care of Martyrs and Injured, people swarm around two barred windows with outstretched arms, thrusting paper work toward the front of the crowd.
Over a year after the Jan. 25 uprising, Egyptians injured in the course of the street action that toppled president Hosni Mubarak say they are still seeking funding for medical treatment and rehabilitation.
Many of them come to the national council hoping for one of the 3,200 promised job opportunities. Others come to complain about invalid compensation checks or untreated injuries.
All injured people can take anywhere from LE 5,000 to LE 15,000, depending on the severity of the injury. The family of a martyr is to receive LE 30,000 as an initial lump sum. Then, the family will receive a monthly stipend of LE 1,750 for the lifetime of those in the deceased’s immediate family, according to Dr Hosni Saber, the director of the National Council for the Care of Martyrs and Injured.
Parliament is currently discussing a draft law to increase the compensation from LE 30,000 to LE 100,000.
Hossam Mohamed Farouq sustained multiple gunshot wounds over a year ago and said he has received no help from the government. He said he is becoming increasingly frustrated by the delay and the disorganization of the national council.
“I have been treated [using] my own money, but now I still have to get out a few more bullets, and I need help. I have been coming here for months and every time I come to receive my money, they tell me that my documents were lost and I have to get them again,” he said.
However, Saber insisted that since he took office on Jan. 8, 2012, the process has been going smoother, blaming the delay in compensation on the administration before him.
“Under my tenure, it takes two weeks to receive compensation from the day you register. But before me, there was another administration and it [took] about eight months … That’s the cause of the disorder we have now. The people from January 2011 have not received their compensation yet,” he told Daily News Egypt.
“I have to compensate every single injured person. That means I have to work 24 hours a day.”
He claimed that those who registered after he took office have received full compensation.
“We have paid about 1,700 valid checks,” he said.
Saber, however, is against the idea of giving a living victim of the revolution a pension. Instead, he says, there are plans to provide work opportunities in state institutions.
“They will also be given the opportunity to work in a [government] job. The concept is to take the people away from the street and to give them jobs. Before they take the job, we make a program for rehabilitation socialization. Not only psychological, but social and behavioral training and coaching and anger management.”
Saber described the “socialization” program as a one-week camp, of which 800 injured revolutionaries have “graduated” so far.
Saber said he is optimistic about future improvements to the current system of providing services to the injured revolutionaries.
Valid ID cards
Nader El-Sheikh came to the council because he said his ID card, identifying him as a victim of the revolution, was not accepted at a state hospital. El-Sheikh said half of his body was crushed in an accident during the revolution and was bedridden for six months. Now, he needs physiotherapy on his recovering knee.
“Until now, I still have no money and no work,” he said, stressing that he cannot afford the treatment.
The council issues special ID cards for the injured of the revolution, guaranteeing them compensation and free treatment at public hospitals.
Another man injured in the revolution, Rabie Hamza, was concerned about the ID cards not functioning as initially expected.
“The IDs that they promised to give us, so that we can receive different services such as free transportation and subsidized medical care, are not working. They are lying to us. They give us things that are not working,” he said.
However, Saber insisted that the ID cards are not his responsibility.
“I have been in contact with the health ministry and the health minister. I have 52 hospitals under contract in Egypt. I have one partner: the minister. The ministry has their hospitals. It is not my hospital.”
Saber said some employees of the hospital might not understand that the ID card acts as insurance. “The people do not understand the meaning of ‘what is insurance?’ ‘What is the card?’ It is a new culture to them.”
On the other hand, health ministry officials say they are aware of the new rules.
“We give instructions to accept these injured with IDs only… If someone has an ID card, they will be treated,” explained Dr Sahar Helmy, a doctor at the Ministry of Health.
If any holder of the special ID card was turned away by public or university hospitals, they should contact the Ministry of Health to complain, she added.
Yet, the problems don’t stop at the access these cards provide. Many Egyptians are concerned about the quality of care available at these particular hospitals.
“The whole health system in Egypt is not good. Some hospitals are not able to treat such people,” Saber said.
Private efforts and NGOs
Some of the most severely injured revolutionaries are only finding help through NGOs and fellow citizens willing to help.
One of the many volunteers is Eman Aboulela. She said she volunteers her time because if she didn’t, these young revolutionaries, or “war veterans,” as she calls them, with the most debilitating injuries, would not have access to the best medical treatment available or access to ongoing rehabilitation.
“These people need medical help; they need social [and] psychological help. So we wanted to do something that would take all of this into consideration. We don’t want to drop a few pounds and go home.”
She has personally connected over 200 injured revolutionaries with the care they need.
Organizations in Austria, France, Germany and Sweden have provided costly, specialized surgeries to many revolutionaries. Aboulela said one of the most expensive cases took place in France. One man was burnt by a Molotov cocktail during a protest and needed skin graphs on 80 percent of his body.
The Egyptian hospitals were not equipped to do the highly advanced procedure. If the French hospital had not done the procedure pro-bono, it would have cost $300,000, she said.
Volunteers helped him connect with the French hospital, organized his transportation, visa, and funds to cover his living costs while in France.
Dr Doaa Mabrouk, a rehabilitation and education consultant, is an expert in teaching of visually impaired persons how to become independent. She volunteers her services for the injured revolutionaries now suffering from visual impairments.
She said that for someone who cannot see, it is essential that they have, and can use, a laptop with special software for their daily lives.
“For a person who is visually impaired, a laptop is their paper and pen. You have everything talking. You have your computer talking, you have your mobile phone talking. You have your thermometer talking,” she explained. “This is how he knows what is in the market. This is how he writes and reads. This is how he does his accounting, his finances, his work.”
The National Council for the Care of Martyrs and Injured have not yet set aside funding for such laptops.
Egyptian vs German rehabilitation
George Schmidt is the general manager of the German Rehabilitation Center in As Salam International Hospital. He said victims of the revolution receive a discount of up to 60 percent. However, it is still one of the most expensive rehabilitation centers in Egypt.
“The average quality of the physiotherapy available in Egypt is of a very low standard. Our center offers treatment of a European standard … We have very badly injured revolution patients — quadriplegic, paraplegic [etc.],” he said, “Our target becomes to make them independent. This means he will not [need] treatment for a lifetime.”
Based on Mabrouk’s experience, she argued that the Egyptian rehabilitation centers are not equipped to treat the injured revolutionaries. “They don’t have the know-how to handle it. The medical care is bad, but not the worst. But the rehabilitation is very bad.”
Volunteer Eman Aboulela is also critical of the “free” hospital care available for the injured revolutionaries.
“They go to the hospitals but the [medical] care is terrible … They did not find [what] they had expected. With this sacrifice, they thought that they would be treated in a better way… Many needed very special surgeries and this was not available,” she said.
She added that even though the special IDs are supposed to offer free admittance into certain hospitals, it is likely that the patients will have to go to private hospitals for X-rays, MRIs and other advanced tests.
“There are hospitals that offer these treatments and [famous] doctors working in these hospitals, but you need support. You need someone to give you money to go get an extra [test] outside the hospital, transportation, other things — so you need some support.”
One volunteer who works to connect injured revolutionaries with specialized medical care, and wishes to remain anonymous, said those injured in the revolution “should be treated like war veterans and war heroes. … The government is giving them some money and then says ‘that’s the end, it’s finished’.
“If it wouldn’t have been them on the frontlines, it would have been the rest of us. The people on the frontlines were protecting the people behind them and the people in their homes.
“The best care is available and Egypt could find the funds to give it to them. There is so much talk … from the politicians, but they aren’t actually doing anything.” –Additional reporting by Mennatallah Fouad Youssef
