Nearly a city of expanding tents outside Mecca, the Saudi hospital staff is preparing for an avalanche of heat -related cases such as Muslim pilgrims early in Hayy this week at summer suffocating temperatures.
The Emergency Hospital Mina is one of the 15 facilities of this type that operate only a few weeks a year around the annual pilgrimage to the most sacred sites of Islam, which in 2024 saw more than 1,300 people who heat in the heat of the desert.
Saudi authorities hope to avoid a fatal repetition of last year’s pilgrimage, when temperatures reached 51.8 degrees Celsius (125 Fahrenheit).
This year’s temperatures are forecast to exceed 40 degrees Celsius as one of the largest annual religious meetings in the world, which gather devotees throughout the Gobe, official commenges on Wednesday.
Until now, the authorities have registered 44 cases of heat exhaustion.
Abdullah Asiri, Deputy Minister of Health of the population of Saudi Arabias, told AFP at the Mina Hospital that “the approach is in heat -related conditions because the Hajj coincides with extreme heat.”
Rest with staff, but there are still no patients, the hospital is part of the kingdom’s efforts to prepare for “the stage of the sausage case” after pilgrims descend to Mina, said Asiri.
Challenging the scorching heat, the pilgrims have already begun to go to Mecca.
Until Sunday, more than 1.4 million pilgrims had arrived in Saudi Arabia for the pilgrimage of several days, according to officials.
The great Mecca mosque is treated by the world’s largest cooling system, according to Saudi state television, with large fans and cooled pavements that splatter the mass complex.
But outside, hiding from heat can be pro -disappear.
– Increase in capacity –
Some pilgrims wear caps or carry umbrella, but others walk on foot without any protection against the sun, such as the Palestine Rabah Mansour, 70, who said that after a lifetime of working outside as a farmer, “the heat does not throw me away.”
“I have legs working in the fields since I was a child,” he said, while sweat dripped on his face.
While many pilgrims can be overcome with religious fervor, Asiri warned the devotees against which they are unnecessarily exposed to hard conditions.
Badr Shreiteh, another Palestinian pilgrim, told AFP that he believed that such difficulties on the Hajj path would increase the blessings he reaps.
“As you can see, we are dripping with sweat,” he said, adding: “The more difficulties we support, the more reward we win.”
According to Asiri, of the Ministry of Health, a total of 50,000 health workers and administrative staff for the HAJJ have been mobilized, exceeding the numbers of previous years.
More than 700 hospital beds are ready, equipped with fans to treat serious cases of heat diseases.
“The capacity this year has expanded in more than 60 percent compared to last year,” said Asiri, waiting for a greater number of patients.
“That’s why we are doing all these measures,” he said.
Last year, medical personnel treated 2,764 pilgrims for heat exhaustion and other heat -related conditions, chrowing the Ministry of Health.
– ‘Challenge’ –
To prevent people from needing hospitalization in the first place, 71 emergency medical points have been established around the sacred sites of MECA in “treating patients in the field before their case deteriorates,” said Asiri.
On the second day of Hajj, the pilgrims will go to Mount Arafat, climb it and recite prayers throughout the day.
Asiri said pilgrims can remain in the shade.
“Most heat -related diseases that occur in Arafat is because they think they should be under the sun,” he said.
“You don’t have to be out of the duration of your tent.
Hajj Minister Tawfiq al-Rabiah, told AFP previously that thousands of foggers and more than 400 water cooling units have been deployed.
The authorities built cooled catwalks, including a recently complete route of four kilometers (2.5 miles) that leads to Arafat.
Hajj deaths last year were an example of the ravages for the heat forged by the heat in 2024, that the Copernicus climate change service said it was the most popular ever registered.
Abdul Majid Ati, from the Philippines, said that “extreme heat, but there are also times when we are inside the (great mosque): it is an extreme cold because tiles and air conditioning.”
