Bahrain releases medical report on al-Khawaja

Bahrain's state news agency, Bahrain News Agency (BNA), on Tuesday published a "preliminary medical report" on the health of imprisoned hunger striker Abulhadi al-Khawaja. The report said "two international independent experts" were commissioned to evaluate his condition and they visited him on April 8 and 9. An extract reads: "During the clinical examination we saw a cachectiv somewhat pale man. His weight was 51.5 kg and his height 172 cm, his blood pressure 100 / 68 mm HG, pulse 64, respiration rate 21/min and body temprature 36.8c. He seemed well and ws cooperative, quite coherent, well oriented in time, place and person. He was able to move around and stand normally for some time. During the current hospitalisation he has been accepting to receive intravenous fluids as well as medication to increase his pottasium level. he has not been continuously on a total fast. During this hospitalisation both orally taken fluids as well as the fluids given intravenously are recorded in his files...Since he started this hunger strike he has lost between 10 to 11 kg of body weight as documented in his files compared to the 62 kg when he started the hunger strike on Janaury 30th 2012. His laboratory results over the period prior to this examination showed specially verly low blood sugars and low pottasium which might be dangerous when no proper medical assessment or treatment is available. Moreover, he is prone to infections due to his low white blood cell count. his current medical satus is stable , after he has been stabilised over the past week. If he countinues to a hunger strike and does not allow any medical interference his life will be in serious danger. If he is transferred will back to the prison, he would need daily monitoring of his health and clinical status and the same specialist treatment as he currently receives in the Bahrain Defence Force Royal medical Services hospital."