Video: https://www.dropbox.com/s/2bfhwhtgqi5r75w/VRP62117.mp4?dl=0
A fire that broke out in a modular Covid-19 hospital in North Macedonia on Wednesday evening killed at least 14 people and left dozens more injured, officials said.
Footage shows fire responders hosing down the blaze that gutted the makeshift medical centre in Tetovo town on September 8. Authorities said an explosion inside the building may have caused the fire.
North Macedonia Prime Minister Zoran Zaev said: ‘A huge tragedy has occurred in the Tetovo Covid-19 centre. An explosion caused a fire. The fire was extinguished but many lives were lost.’
Tetovo deputy fire chief Saso Trajcevski said the fire became huge because of the amount of plastic inside the hospital.
Injured patients have been sent to medical centres in the capital Skopje as authorities investigate the cause of the explosion.
Tetovo, with a population of roughly 50,000 people, is one of the country’s worst-hit regions in the pandemic. Its modular Covid-19 hospital was built last year to tend to patients infected with the novel coronavirus.