A WHO team in the city also reported that the water and electricity infrastructure had been badly disrupted, the UN health agency said in a statement published by its Geneva headquarters.

"The work of those who are able to get to work at any of the hospitals is made extremely difficult by the fact that the main health storage facilities in the town have been completely emptied by looters," WHO said.

"All medicines and medical supplies have been stolen and even the windows, doors and cooling system have been either stolen or destroyed," it said.

"All health centres in the town have also been looted, as well as the local office of the Department of Health," it added.

"This is only a snapshot from one town and WHO believes this situation is repeated across much of Iraq," it said.

The WHO team of two doctors, two pharmacists and an engineer found just 40 patients in a 400-bed hospital, all with minor or moderate injuries, at the Kirkuk governorate's main hospital, Azadi Hospital, formerly called Saddam General Hospital.

They believed the numbers were low because both patients and staff considered it too unsafe to come to the hospital.

In the present circumstances the chances of survival for anyone with a serious injury were low, the WHO said.

Between half and 75 percent of health workers are currently not coming to work, WHO said. Most have not been paid and there was little sign they would be paid for April, it added.

The General Hospital in Kirkuk had been partially looted, although the city's other hospital, a maternity and children's hospital, was left largely intact, it added.

"Both hospitals are estimated to be running at about 25 percent of their normal capacity," WHO said.

The UN agency has supplied Azadi Hospital with items such as oxygen cylinders.

Many health workers across the country continue to work in difficult conditions, with some sleeping in their hospitals, WHO said.

Reports from Baghdad, southern Nasiriyah and Basra had also spoken of medical staff defending their hospitals and clinics against armed looters, it said.

On Sunday, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said the humanitarian situation in the Iraqi cities of Nasiriyah and Kirkuk was reassuring.

ICRC had also just gained access to Kirkuk for the first time since the outbreak of the US-led war.

SPACE.WIRE