An NHS surgeon who has spent the last 30 years volunteering in the world’s most dangerous areas of conflict has described the scenes of utter despair in Gaza as some of the most distressing he’s ever seen.
Dr David Nott admits that despite decades of experience, the “jam packed” hospitals of Rafah were a “shock to the system”.
Pride of Britain winner Dr Nott, who was awarded an OBE in 2012, runs the David Nott Foundation with his wife, Elly, organising training in emergency surgery for medics working in war and disaster zones. He spent a month volunteering in Gaza in January.
The father-of-two worked in the only functioning Gaza Health Ministry Hospital in Rafah, holding around 40 beds and two operating theatres. Recalling the horrors he saw, he tells The Mirror: “It was a really difficult mission.
“At the time, there were about a million people in Rafah, with hundreds more coming in daily. The main problem was the amount of people.
“There were people dying of routine things like not being able to get their drugs for diabetes or appendectomy. There was nothing I could do for them.”
The hospitals were “jam-packed,” according to Dr Nott, who adds: "Going through Rafah Gate was a real shock to the system. I've never seen so many hundreds of thousands of people, families in tents, polythene sheets on top of people - it was extremely cold."
Dr Nott, who says the neighbouring city of Khan Yunis was being bombed, with drones flying overhead, says all the patients he saw had “injury severity scores” of 25, when 15 meant patients “probably wouldn’t make it.”
It comes after news that four of the hostages taken during the Nova musical festival were rescued over the weekend.
Noa Argamani, 26, Almog Meir Jan, 22, Andrei Kozlov, 27, and 41-year-old Shlomi Ziv’s release has sparked relief - however there has also been much criticism as between 100 and 280 people were killed in the rescue operation, with numbers differing vastly between Hamas and Israel sources.
According to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, the death toll in Gaza has now reached 37,000. Reports from the UN agency for Palestinian refugees suggest more children have been killed in Gaza in a matter of months than in four years of conflict worldwide.
UNICEF records show that 1,000 children have needed amputations in Gaza, performed in incredibly challenging conditions.
Reports from the UN agency for Palestinian refugees suggest more children have been killed in Gaza in a matter of months than in four years of conflict worldwide.
Also a vascular surgeon, Dr Nott, who lives in Hammersmith, says: “I walked into the A&E department and I would look at all these patients that were burned, that had amputations and there was nothing I could do.
“The issues were the facilities we were operating in. We didn’t have time to reconstruct someone’s limb so they all had amputations.”
He said the number of patients requiring treatment was “overwhelming”, with a high risk of cross-infection due to the close proximity of the beds.
He says: “You couldn’t move. You walked into the hospital in the morning and there were just hundreds of people in the corridor. People were dying and there was nothing that could be done
“There were children playing amongst the people that had died in the corridor.”
Dr Nott’s humanitarian work began in 1993, when he flew to Bosnia after seeing the conflict on the news.
And, while volunteering in Syria, he refused to stop operating on a patient as IS fanatics burst into his theatre room.
“Everyone was leaving, but I knew I couldn’t possibly leave this little girl alone,” he says.
“I said to the Red Cross anaesthetist with me, ‘Do you want to go?’ He said ‘no, I’ll stay with you’.
“So we stayed together, both believing that all three of us would die.
“But I carried on with the operation and, as the minutes ticked by, I tried not to panic. I was expecting the worst, but I kept operating. We were supposed to be blown up, and I was thinking ‘if it happens, I’ve done a lot with my life really’.
“If our time was up, I just wanted to be there to hold the little girl’s hand.”
For Dr Nott, the continued horror of war simply fires his determination to help wherever he can.
Giving his time for free, he has worked everywhere from Afghanistan to Iraq, Syria and Gaza.
Dr Nott, whose children are seven and nine, adds: “I will continue humanitarian work until I die.
“I’m not sure how long I will continue working in the NHS. It’s a matter of leaving a legacy.
“I’ve had so much experience and I want to pass that to other surgeons, so they don’t have to spend 30 years learning it.”
Over the years his incredible work has been recognised across many platforms, and he describes receiving a Pride of Britain Special Recognition Award back in 2016 as “one of the major highlights of his life.”
Speaking as nominations for this year’s awards open, he recalls the emotional moment host Carol Vorderman presented him with his trophy - something made even more special as he saved her life when she was admitted to hospital with sepsis.
He said: “Winning the award was fantastic. It was one of the major highlights of my life to win that award.
“It was amazing that Carol Voderman gave it to me and I saved her life.
“She came in with sepsis and could have easily died. Being on that stage with her meant a lot to me.”
Most recently, Dr Nott has been training six Ukrainian surgeons at the Edinburgh Royal College of Surgeons, so they could go on to pass on the knowledge to medics in their own country, he adds: “It’s important to continue the work through these surgeons.”
Dr Nott has also raised hundreds of thousands of pounds for charitable causes.
He adds: “It’s the legacy I am trying to leave.
“To be a war surgeon is a fine art - knowing the right thing to do for a patient with what’s available. If you do too much, that patient will die as surely as if you do too little.”