\u201cIt was like Kabul come to Paris,\u201d\u009d said one doctor at a military hospital on the outskirts of Paris, as the city\u2019s emergency medical teams responded to the gravest attack on French soil since the Second World War.
\nAt least 415 people were wounded in last Friday\u2019s attacks and rushed to 38 different hospitals in and around Paris.
\nThe city put into action its \u201cplan blanc\u201d\u009d, a maximum level of mobilisation designed to deal with \u201cexceptional medical scenarios\u201d\u009d. It has been hailed as a testament to France\u2019s renowned public hospitals system that only three of the injured victims are believed to have died in hospital, arresting the death toll at 129 when it could have been far higher.
\nParisian hospitals had carried out a drill for a terrorist attack that morning, just hours before the real attacks took place. The \u201cplan blanc\u201d\u009d, devised in 2004 for just such a crisis, allowed staff to requisition nurses, surgeons, resuscitation staff, operating theatres, beds, ambulances and psychiatric services.<\/p>\n