Doors 'closed' at Pakistan hospital where fire killed 14 babies, witness says

Witness says doors 'closed' at Pakistan hospital where fire killed 14 babies, as funerals get underway In short: A witness says doors were "closed" at hospital in Pakistan where a deadly fire broke out in a maternity ward on Wednesday. Funerals are underway for 14 babies killed in the blaze. What's next? The government has launched an investigation into the fire it said was sparked by an air conditioner. Doors were "closed" to a hospital in Pakistan where a fire killed 14 babies, a witness says, as funerals get underway for infants who died in the tragedy. A blaze broke out on the third floor of the mother and child health ward at the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) in Islamabad shortly before 7am local time on Wednesday. Mudasir, who lost his child and only gave his first name, told Reuters the building that housed the ward "had no fire security, no proper exits". "All doors were closed, only one door was [open] for us to visit our children," said Mudasir. Jaweria, a woman who said she lost her infant and only gave her first name, said the door to the neonatal intensive care unit was locked, AFP reported. "I do not believe this. Give me my child back … why did the doctors leave the children there?" she said. Rana Imran Sikander, the hospital's executive director, told the BBC the ward's door was not locked but was manned. He cited the need to protect babies from being stolen, something that has happened before at government hospitals. Health minister Mustafa Kamal told reporters outside the hospital that CCTV footage showed that a "spark from the air conditioner fell, and the fire spread within a minute". He said 26 fire extinguishers were used to try to put out the flames but that there were no water sprinklers in the ward. Nineteen people, including seven children, were rescued, Deputy Interior Minister Talal Chaudhry said. 'Patients were trapped' Witnesses described chaotic and harrowing scenes, including intense smoke and broken glass, a slow response from emergency services, and guards reportedly preventing people from leaving the building. Khurram Mehmood, 40, told AFP he lost his three-day-old daughter in the blaze and that rescuers took hours to arrive. "My wife was in the ward. They took everyone out. We were sitting on the road waiting for help," he said. Witness Abdul Ghafoor told AFP that he went into the hospital to save patients but could not reach the maternity ward. "The fire spread very quickly. There were babies as young as one day old," he said. "There was thick black smoke inside and patients were trapped," he said. "Rescue teams arrived after almost two hours [after the fire started]." Another witness, who did not give her name, said hospital security "were not letting them out and the guards were stopping them". "People had to break the door down and rescue teams had to break the windows to control the fire," she added. The Islamabad chief commissioner, Sohail Ashraf, said emergency responders reached the scene "immediately" after the first call for help was made just before 7am local time, and brought the fire under control. AFP reporters saw a nurse call out the names of babies who had perished in the fire as families gathered outside. Other patients streamed outside, their faces covered in soot, with one man holding a newborn in his arms. A mother with black residue from the smoke on her hands stood crying outside the hospital as she held her 10-day-old baby in her arms. "People were screaming. There was black smoke. We ran for our lives. Thank God my baby is safe," Shagufta Parveen, the mother, told AFP. Health secretary sacked Funerals had already started to take place on Wednesday afternoon, as Islamic burials usually happen within 24 hours of death. AFP journalists saw a tiny body in a white shroud being carried through the streets of the nearby city of Rawalpindi, followed by a solemn line of mourners, before a funeral prayer. Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif called for an investigation and said the "strictest possible action" should be taken against those found to be responsible. He sacked health secretary Aslam Ghauri, the country's top civil servant for the department, a statement from his office said. Minister Chaudhry told media outside the hospital that authorities would launch a probe and denied that rescuers did not arrive quickly enough on the public holiday. "What happened is sad, but there was no negligence when it came to the rescue operations," he said, adding that teams reached the hospital in six minutes. "What happened is to be inquired, where the hospital lacked facilities." The UN children's agency UNICEF said it was "deeply saddened" by the deaths and called for an "urgent review and strengthening of fire prevention and safety standards across health facilities". PIMS, the hospital, is centrally located in Islamabad and is one of the main public hospitals for the city of around 1.1 million people. Fires in large buildings are frequent in Pakistan, often due to poor safety laws and building codes, as well as lax enforcement. In January, more than 65 people were killed in a shopping centre fire in the port city of Karachi. At least 11 people perished in another shopping mall fire in Karachi in 2023. And in 2012, at least 250 labourers died at a garment factory blaze in Karachi. AFP/Reuters