Deadly fire rips through Iraq COVID ward: Health official

Dozens dead in fire in COVID-19 isolation ward at a hospital in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriya.

At least 36 people have been killed in a fire at a Covid isolation ward at an Iraqi hospital, the second such deadly inferno in a Covid-19 unit in three months, a health official has said. The fire broke out at the Al-Hussein hospital in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah late Monday and was still ongoing, according to an AFP correspondent. Haydar al-Zamili, a spokesman for the local health authorities, told AFP that the “fire… ripped through the Covid isolation ward,” and put the death toll at 36.