Hilali, the Saudi father of three boys who died in a school bus accident, has called for staff at Adham General Hospital to be investigated for negligence and failing to provide adequate medical services to the injured. The accident, which occurred in Adham town to the south of Taif, resulted in five deaths and injuries to 18. Three of those killed were the Al-Hilali brothers, the others a schoolgirl and the driver of the bus. Director of Adham General Hospital Nafea Al-Jihani denied any failings on the part of his staff but said that the incident exposed a blood shortage at the hospital's blood bank. Al-Jihani noted that relatives of the injured at the time of the accident appealed to pupils and teachers from the school to donate blood at the hospital. The hospital also contacted Qalwah General Hospital in Al-Baha for further blood supplies. An eyewitness who helped transport some of the accident victims to the hospital said, however, that there were evident failures on the part of hospital staff to respond to the situation. “When I arrived at the hospital, I pressed the alarm bell in the Emergency Room to alert staff to the injured I'd brought in and others close behind being brought by the Red Crescent,” said Sergeant Sa'eed Bin Ahmad Al-Zahrani of Al-Leeth Police Traffic Department who was on duty close to the site of the accident. “I was surprised to find no one but a man dressed in traditional Saudi clothes, and it wasn't clear if he was working at the hospital or not.” “There was no doctor on duty in the emergency room, and when I looked for people to help get the injured from the car, I could only find the cleaners,” Al-Zahrani said. Police sources said that one of the pupils who died at the scene of the accident, Ghazi Aziz Hashim Al-Hilali, was admitted to hospital at 6 A.M. but according to the medical report was not checked by hospital staff until 11 A.M. when his death was confirmed. Another eyewitness, Abdullah Al-Dhahoob Al-Qarzi, who also works as a policeman at Adham Police Station, said that the Civil Defense were slow in their response to the incident, and that they arrived after the Red Crescent despite being based closer to the site of the accident.
