caused similar damage from flying shrapnel To make matters worse wounds easily became infected because of the muddy filthy trenches soldiers lived in and even a slight injury and infection could be deadly An estimated 10 million soldiers were killed in World War I with another 20 million crippled or badly wounded More than one half of the troops who fought in the war were dead wounded or missing by the time the war ended Civilians also perished from bombs and shells or from the hunger and disease NEW WEAPONS OF WAR spread by wartime conditions The number of World War I casualties was so high in large part because of newer more lethal D0 OR DIE weapons Artillery and mortars could fire farther and faster and artillery killed more people than When Souttar joined the British forces any other weapon could Machine guns could he was appointed surgeon in chief of mow down approaching troops Handheld lamethrowers sprayed fuel oil that was ignited the Belgian field hospitals The British as it left the device Poison gases killed few but and French were fighting in Belgium to incapacitated many and caused extensive pain and terror Airplanes a relatively new invention protect the country against Germany and were first used to find information about the to prevent Germany from moving onward enemy Later they were armed with machine guns and then bombs Submarines could attack into France In Antwerp Belgium Souttar with torpedoes underwater or could surface to set up a hospital for casualties from the use guns on deck With these new weapons Belgian army The hospital was large with death came from every direction 150 beds and excellent equipment A staff
US soldiers learn to use machine guns at Camp Sherman in Chillicothe Ohio preparing them for
of approximately 50 included eight doctors 20 nurses and various assistants The wards were already full when Souttar arrived with some serious cases but he noted the wounded were cheerful The battlefront where opposing forces met and clashed was many miles away and the hospital staff expected the battle to keep its distance In previous wars serious injuries had generally been treated in hospitals far back from the front A WORLD OF CHALLENGES lines Yet the German army quickly pushed World War I eventually involved more than 30 countries from throughout Europe North Africa forward toward Antwerp and the hospital the Middle East and Asia Medical personnel wards wounded filled with soldiers Then had to adapt to the special challenges of where they were stationed whether jungle swamp the Germans started bombing Antwerp or the heat and sand of a desert They might itself As the city emptied the hospital face rain and mud or snow and bitter cold They might be stationed on land or at sea Each staff moved all patients to the basement climate brought new challenges in terms of the for safety After a shell landed in the local diseases and terrain garden orders came to evacuate London In a war that took place over an extensive area specific injuries and illnesses varied from double decker buses converted for war place to place Doctors in France and Russia use collected the medical staff and primarily had to treat wounded soldiers Sickness abounded in the Balkans and East Africa The patients The staff all patients and much Serbian armies death rate reached 40 percent of the equipment was safely shuttled away because of the disease typhus and other Souttar's team did not have much of epidemics in the Balkans a break before they were sent again to
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