On August 26, a sudden fire broke out in the nursery of Pakistan’s largest public medical facility, the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences in Islamabad, leaving 14 newborns dead and only one infant alive. The nurse who pulled that surviving baby from the flames, Razia Noreen, has become a symbol of courage across the nation, though she continues to grieve the children she could not reach.
In her first on-the-record interview with international media, Noreen recounted the chaotic seconds that changed her life. She and her colleagues had just completed a check on the 15 newborns under their care and moved to an adjacent room to prepare scheduled injections when she spotted flickering flames through the doorway. Without hesitation, she dropped the syringe she held and sprinted back into the smoke-charged space.
Dramatic 51-second CCTV footage from the hospital’s security system captures the split-second rescue: Noreen grabbed the nearest infant, clutched the newborn tightly to her chest to shield it from scorching heat and smoke, and exited the nursery just eight seconds after entering. She immediately passed the baby to a waiting doctor in the hallway, and turned immediately to rush back in for the remaining 14 children. By that point, however, conditions inside the nursery had deteriorated catastrophically, a later government inquiry confirmed, with toxic smoke and open flames filling the entire room in less than two minutes, making re-entry impossible.
Refusing to give up, Noreen and a second nurse dropped to the ground, where smoke concentrations were lower, and tried to crawl through the doorway. Thick smoke blinded her, clogged her airway, and triggered violent coughing that left her gasping for breath. She pushed forward until advancing flames forced her to retreat, she said. Minutes later, when the fire was contained, she learned the devastating truth: all 14 remaining infants had died. Noreen said she collapsed to the floor, overwhelmed by shock.
In the wake of the tragedy, Noreen’s selfless split-second choice has resonated across Pakistan’s diverse social and religious landscape. As a member of the country’s small Christian minority, Noreen has drawn praise from both Christian and Muslim communities. The national government has announced she will receive the Sitara-i-Khidmat (Star of Service), one of Pakistan’s highest civilian honors, in addition to a cash reward for her bravery, and ordinary Pakistanis have widely hailed her as a national hero.
For Noreen, however, the act was not one of heroism, but simple instinct. A mother herself, she framed her actions as nothing more than the duty any caregiver owes to the children entrusted to them. “Can any mother watch a child burning in a fire?” she asked. “No. Mothers do not do favors for their children. It is their duty. When newborns come to the nursery, separated from their own mothers, we become their mothers for that time. We feed them, care for them, watch over them. The mothers had entrusted their babies to us, so I had to act.” She added that when she stepped into the fire, she did not pause to think of her own safety: “I only had one mission: to save lives. I didn’t care if I made it out alive. My only goal was to bring all of them out.”
Despite the widespread acclaim, Noreen remains deeply traumatized by the tragedy. She told the Associated Press she has barely slept since the fire, and that every time she nears the former nursery space, memories of the flames and the lost babies overwhelm her. Sometimes, she said, she still thinks she can hear the infants crying, and she collapses to the ground. “The deaths of those children have broken me,” she said. “It may take me years to recover from this.” She even developed a 39.4-degree Celsius fever in the days after the fire, but still agreed to the interview to share her story, saying “Those babies do not let me sleep.” In a tearful closing message, she extended a plea to the families of the 14 newborns who died: “Please forgive me for not being able to save your babies.”
The cause of the fire has shifted in official accounts, with hospital and district officials first blaming a faulty air conditioning unit that exploded, before later revising the account to say a blast linked to a nebulizer sparked the blaze. The official government inquiry released after the event identified systemic, serious failures in the facility’s fire safety protocols and emergency response protocols. Eight senior hospital officials have been suspended pending disciplinary action over the lapses that allowed the fire to turn deadly.