Over 50 dead after another oxygen tank blast and fire at coronavirus ward in Iraqi hospital

Fire tore through a coronavirus isolation ward at the al-Hussein hospital in Iraq’s southern city of Nasiriyah, on July 12, 2021, killing at least 52 people and wounding 22 others. Demonstrators gathered outside the hospital to blame the local government for the fire reportedly triggered by an oxygen tank explosion. A state of emergency was imposed in the Dhi Qar governorate, of which Nasiriyah is the capital. It was the second deadly blaze at an Iraqi hospital in three months.