Having arrived in Belarus, Israeli medics visited Minsk hospitals and examined the injured in the terrorist attack at "Kastrychnitskaya" subway station on April 11. Elon Glassberg has reported that Israeli doctors saw the injured in a serious condition. They had suffered mainly from the blast, the elements, it was carrying, and the heat.
«When a man is hit by the blast, he gets swung, he falls down and, certainly, gets some injuries. We saw people with burns, most injuries are caused by different fragments. We saw the expected damages. Victims with burns are those who have suffered the most. The condition of those in emergency hospitals leaves much to be desired. Many of them will receive disability group, but I hope they will manage to survive — not all, but, perhaps, the majority,» he said.
According to head of the organization of medical Health Ministry of Belarus Ivan Ryzhko, eight people are currently in need of prosthetics. «Well, you know, I mean arms and feet,» he said.
«In such circumstances, one cannot promise 100% survival rate. One can only promise 100% effort. But we have attended Minsk hospitals and can say that they won’t receive better care anywhere in the world,» said Yoram Klein.
«An expert is someone who has already made all possible mistakes. Therefore, we’ve shared the experience of our mistakes with the Belarusian colleagues to avoid them,» he added.
Psychologically Affected are Three to Four Times More, Glassberg
Israeli doctors reported that they were unable to provide victims of terrorist attacks with psychological help. «Because of the language barrier we were unable to help in this direction. There are always three to four times more such people than the physically injured,» said Elon Glassberg.
According to him, psychological rehabilitation after acute reactions may take two to three weeks. «If the stress disorders continue, which is possible to last for years, it is necessary to seek professional help,» he said.
«There is a unique aspect of this stress: it hits both the victim and his family. When tragedy happens, everyone is focused on the victims: journalists, etc. But life goes on, and they are getting forgotten. They start feeling that they have been forgotten. They need support of their friend? As well as special assistance until the stress is gone,» added Yoram Klein.
Psychological assistance should also be provided to the witnesses of the explosion, who haven’t been hurt physically, but have seen the happening with their own eyes and have now fear to use the subway. «First of all, they must understand that to feel fear in this situation — this is normal. If a week later, this fear interferes with normal life, they need to contact the experts,» said Yoram Klein.
«We have a whole army of professionals in all settings — psychologists, psychotherapists, psychiatrists. Refer to them ambulatory,» said the colonel of medical service Witold Zharinov.
«The victims need to understand that fear is not a disease. There are no universal recipes to help here. Someone feels better after talking about the terrorist attack. There is a myth that the pilot after the tragedy should return to flights. It really help someone, but not everyone. But above all, there should be support of the family,» said Yoram Klein.
Ivan Ryzhko answered Telegraf, why physicians discover only fragments of marble slabs in the injured bodies, while according to official information, the explosive device contained bolts and fittings.
«There is nothing surprising, since really the walls could not stand, plates were smashing, so the people got injured by these pieces,» he said. However, the representative of the Health Ministry did not specify whether bolts and nuts had been found in any of the victims’ injuries.
Belarusians Intuitively were Doing what was Really Needed, Glassberg
According to Elon Glassberg, the Belarusian specialists didn’t include any specific schemes of evacuation from the subway.
«We understand that the majority of victims were evacuated by passengers themselves. Intuitively, people did what was needed. However, we must not rely on a single intuition, it would be good to develop a special evacuation scheme,» said Elon Glassberg.
