Chicago Tribune - August 5, 2003
E.A. Torriero, Tribune staff reporter on assignment in Iraq

BAGHDAD -- Four months ago an American found sitting in Dr. Kifah Al-Yassine's dental chair would have faced a fate far worse than a root canal.

But the war is over. And while former regime loyalists are still taking potshots at U.S. soldiers and bad-mouthing them, Al-Yassine was peering into an American jaw gently looking for intelligence.

"Mercury," he said with the disgust of a man encountering stuff of mass destruction. "Very bad for the body."

"They're old fillings," the American mumbled as Al-Yassine poked around with a sharp instrument.

"Ah, here a crater," he said, scraping the top of a tooth. "A big hole. It needs to be filled."

"A cavity you mean?" the American asked.

"Yes, a crater," Al-Yassine said, holding up a worn square mirror that made a dip in the tooth look like the Grand Canyon. "We need to fix it now."

What began as a five-buck teeth cleaning was turning into a potentially bloody encounter. An American molar was about to be put to an Iraqi drilling.

Iraqis who use the French-educated dentist assured a foreigner that his office was clean. Indeed, after rapping hard on the door locked to keep out looters, patients arrive in a dimly lit waiting room that has the chloroform smell of an operating ward.

A tribesman wearing a white gown and a turban sat with arms folded and scowl on his face. A woman next to him covered from head to toe in a black said nothing. Even for war-weary Iraqis, going to the dentist does not seem pleasant.

There is no Muzak playing in Al-Yassine's office. And there are no hygienists asking how your day is going.

Al-Yassine's worn dental chair is state-of-the-art for Iraq: a decade old and made in Japan. It's a bit rusty and the overhead light is dim.

"Runs like a Toyota," the dentist said.

Al-Yassine pulled on rubber gloves. For years, Saddam Hussein's regime masked the nation's AIDS problem by denying it existed. Now Iraqi officials are worried that outsiders will bring in HIV.

"You want to make the tooth numb?" the dentist asked, holding the drill in one hand.

The dilemma: pain or possible infection from a shot of Iraqi Novocain. The choice: pain.

Al-Yassine fished for a drill bit that was stored in what resembled a tool kit. The dentist drilled quickly, not even pausing when a few gunshots rang out outside. He then filled the cavity with a European-made product--expiration date 2007--and later streamlined the filling to fit to the bite.

"Now rinse," he said.

"With Iraqi water?"

"It's OK, it's filtered water but don't swallow it," he said.

After basting the patient's teeth with some cleaning solution, the procedure was finished. Total bill: $30. No co-payment. No deductible.

"If you were French I would have charged $125," the dentist said, offering no further explanation.

With the fall of the Iraqi regime, Al-Yassine has grand plans to expand and modernize his clinic. He may even buy an X-ray machine. In the meantime, like many a thriving dentist, he is going off on summer holiday to the Turkish seaside.

"The family needs to get away from the American occupation," he explained.

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