Meet the Heroine: Dr. Najla Al-Sonboli

Dr. Najla Al-Sonboli

Dr. Najla Al-Sonboli is a pediatrician in Yemen serving the country’s largest city of Sana’a. In the face of war and grave personal risk, Najla has shown incredible resilience, working tirelessly to provide essential medical care to save babies and children’s lives, organising staff to provide voluntary services with minimal resources and being responsive to new challenges her pediatric department faces.

Najla loves kids and can’t bear the thought that anything could hurt them. So she decided to work for them. Now, she loves to work for them even more because they have been hurt in so many ways due to this endless war going on in Yemen. Children are dying from diseases, hunger, pieces of rocket and gunshots. Many have lost their parents in this war, many are displaced and separated from their families and their homeland.

Photo source: BBC

The toughest challenges she has faced are to work without salary and to work under fire. One time, in front of her eyes, while she was trying to get in the hospital, three rockets struck the military camp that is located across the road. She was in the street between the gates of the hospital and the military camp when they hit the camp. Each day she leaves home not knowing if she will be back home or not. But when she sees how sick people come to the hospital, despite all the security challenges, it makes her strong enough to go to the hospital to help them and stand by them.

Feature Photo source: Gettyimages