Egyptian doctors at two public hospitals said Saturday that the death toll from Friday’s protests, which swept Cairo with calls for the departure of President Hosni Mubarak, could be much higher than what was previously reported by security.
Casualty reports have greatly varied. The Associated Press quoted security sources on Saturday as saying that the death toll across Egypt has reached 62 people. Al Jazeera satellite TV station said on Saturday that at least 30 people were killed in Cairo.
Egypt’s largest public hospital, Al-Qasr Al-Aini, received at least 1000 cases from Friday at 6 PM until now, emergency doctors at the hospital said.
“I treated 20 cases, out of whom, six died,” a surgeon, who would prefer to remain anonymous, said.
The doctor was not able to provide Al-Masry Al-Youm with the total death toll. “A plainclothes policeman came to the hospital yesterday, and warned us of revealing the real death toll. Police have prevented most of the doctors from accessing the morgue,” he said.
The same doctor said that most of the cases received Saturday had gunshot wounds from live ammunition to the lungs, the head, and the intestines.
In Alexandria’s Al-Amiriyya Hospital, an emergency room doctor told Al-Masry Al-Youm that the hospital received the bodies of 38 dead protesters on Friday alone.
