Earthquake in Afghanistan | EMERGENCY is Available to Support the Population

Update: 3 September 2025:

In the hours immediately after Sunday’s earthquake in Afghanistan, EMERGENCY gave its availability to local authorities to provide support to the affected population.

“We sent our mobile teams with two ambulances to Jalalabad,” says Dejan Panic, EMERGENCY’s Country Director in Afghanistan. “What they saw was a very sad scene. Devastated people, families destroyed, families lost. The situation is dire.”

On Monday, two children were admitted to EMERGENCY’s Kabul Surgical Centre. One was the sole survivor of their family, after their house collapsed.

Six more injured people – five women and one man – have since undergone surgery at our Kabul hospital. They are now in critical but stable conditions.

We are ready to receive more injured people in the coming hours.

EMERGENCY has set up an ambulance referral system to transport patients to our hospital in Kabul. Two ambulances are bringing injured patients from Jalalabad, while another is ready to transfer injured people arriving at the airport by helicopter from areas unreachable by ground transport.

The ambulances are staffed by our teams of Afghan doctors and nurses.

1 September 2025:

Hundreds of people have been confirmed dead and thousands injured following the 6.0 magnitude earthquake that struck eastern Afghanistan last night. So far, two injured children have been admitted to EMERGENCY’s Surgical Centre in Kabul. The humanitarian NGO immediately made itself available to the authorities to provide support to the affected population.

“15 hours after the earthquake struck, we received two injured children, aged 12 and 13, both from Kunar province,” says Dejan Panic, EMERGENCY’s Afghanistan Country Director. “They have traumatic injuries but are in stable conditions. One child is the sole survivor from their family.”

“Last night in Kabul, we were woken by the earthquake,” says Alessandro Pirisi, EMERGENCY’s Operations Manager in Afghanistan. “This morning, we learnt that the epicentre was in an area four hours away from us. We immediately informed local authorities of our availability to admit the most seriously injured patients, who are currently being airlifted to Kabul and Jalalabad, to our hospitals in the city of Kabul and in Anabah, in the Panjshir valley.”

From the very start, EMERGENCY has coordinated with local authorities and other humanitarian organisations to support the population. This tragedy affects a country where 22.9 million people – more than half the population – were already in need of humanitarian aid.

EMERGENCY has been present in Afghanistan since 1999. Today, its work continues at the Kabul Surgical Centre, Lashkar-Gah Surgical Centre (Helmand), Surgical-Paediatric and Maternity Centres in Anabah (Panjshir), and a network of more than 40 first aid and primary healthcare clinics, connected by a 24/7 ambulance service.