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 The treatment is almost impossible for Libyan families to obtain due
to the collapse of the health system and an economic crisis that
makes sending patients abroad unaffordable.
The doctors have been visiting eastern Libya since 2012, but did not
go to Benghazi for two years because of fighting that has destroyed
parts of the city and is still raging in one downtown neighborhood.
This time they hope to operate on 30 to 40 children, though the
final number will depend on the complexity of children's' defects.
Most are under three years old. Some could die within weeks without
the treatment.
Khaled al-Fellah's 19-month old daughter Zahra was among the first
to receive the surgery.
"Her heart problem was discovered the day of her birth . . . We
received basic treatment to maintain the condition as there were no
possibilities (for medical care)," he said.
"The diagnosis was wrong many times. When the diagnosis was correct
a surgery had to be performed. We should have had this surgery 10
months ago."
The team is led by William Novick, an American doctor who set up a
foundation that has treated children with heart disease in more than
30 developing countries. They train local staff as they work.
Initially the trips to Libya were paid for by Libyan public funds,
but these dried up and they now depend on private donations.
For the past three years rival alliances have been battling for
power in Libya, setting up competing governments in Tripoli and the
east. Benghazi, where forces loyal to Khalifa Haftar have been
fighting Islamists and other opponents, has seen some of the
heaviest violence.
A U.N.-backed government has been trying to establish itself in
Tripoli since last March, but Haftar and the eastern government have
rejected it. Across the country, public services have continued a
slow decline.
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The health sector, which was heavily dependent on foreign staff
before Libya's 2011 revolution, has been crippled by their departure
in the turmoil that followed. Medical supplies and equipment are in
short supply, and many hospitals are shut or barely functional.
Conditions at the Benghazi Medical Center have got worse, Novick
said.
"The staff is gone. The maintenance of the hospital is low," he
said. "I've found that the situation has very much deteriorated
since 2012."
Reida El Oakley, the health minister for the eastern government,
said a private clinic in Tripoli is the only medical facility in the
country that offers heart operations.
The 28,000 Libyan dinar ($20,000) cost is prohibitive for Libyans
who "go bankrupt to treat their children" but struggle to withdraw
even a few hundred dinars from the bank because of a liquidity
crisis.
Trips by Novick's teams have been delayed because of funding
shortages. Lives have been lost because of a lack of treatment, said
Oakley.
"We have more than 300 kids waiting for open heart surgery, maybe
400," he said. "(The doctors) need to be here full time."
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