At least 41 people were killed and many others wounded in a huge fire that broke out in a hospital treating COVID-19 patients in Iraq's southern province of Dhi Qar, official Iraqi News Agency (INA) reported.

The evening massive fire hit the quarantine center for coronavirus patients in al-Hussein Hospital in the provincial capital city of al-Nasiriyah, some 375 km south of Baghdad, the INA said.

The fire spread in the quarantine center, and firefighters and civil defense teams were striving to evacuate the patients and health workers while trying to put out the fire of some 20 sandwich panel caravans in the makeshift center at the site of al-Hussein Hospital, it added.

Later on, spokesman for the Health Department of Dhi Qar Province Ammar al-Zamily told the INA that the firefighters managed to put out the fire.

Dhi Qar's health department declared a state of emergency after the fire, al-Zamily said.

Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi held an emergency meeting with some cabinet ministers and security commanders to discuss the hospital fire and its consequences, al-Kadhimi's media office said in a statement.

Iraqi Parliament Speaker Mohammed al-Halbousi tweeted that the parliament session on Tuesday will discuss the incident. 

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