Antakya, Turkey – In a field hospital set up for animals in this southern city, a cat meowed in half-hearted protest as he was gently laid on a table, examined, and injected with painkillers and antibiotics by a volunteer veterinarian and her assistant.

The British Shorthair had been stuck in an apartment following two huge earthquakes on February 6. After almost two weeks, he finally jumped to the ground several floors below, where somebody found him injured.

The dust-coated cat could not use his back legs and was suffering from suspected hypothermia, so he was transferred to an incubator to warm up, where he continued protesting plaintively behind the glass. Once warm, he would probably have to be sent to a clinic outside the disaster zone where X-rays could be done on his legs and spine.

“There are lots of animals stuck inside rubble, many have been trapped for a long time,” Zinnet Patan, a 49-year-old vet normally living in Istanbul, told Al Jazeera at the field hospital.

“They get dehydrated and they have broken bones and wounds. The equipment is really limited here, so we only do first aid. Local vets are also the survivors of the earthquake and are often not able to help, so we are trying to help all kinds of animals.”

In a tent in a park about 1km (0.6 mile) downstream from Antakya’s devastated old city, Patan treats close to 100 animals a day. She administers vaccinations, stitches wounds, and helps animals give birth and care for their sickly young. Birds chirruped and cooed from their cages inside the small tent.

“People in this area really love pigeons – we once had 40 pigeons come in at once,” she said.

The historic city of Antakya in Hatay province has been devastated by the magnitude 7.8 and 7.6 earthquakes, which have now killed more than 40,000 people in Turkey and about 5,800 in Syria.

It is thought that nearly 35 percent of the buildings in Hatay have collapsed, while about 30 percent are severely damaged.

Amid the immense human suffering caused by the earthquakes, animals have been hugely affected, too.

Read the rest of the article published by Al Jazeera English here.