Attacks on Health

Video: Johns Hopkins' Leonard Rubenstein on the Attacks on Syria's Medical Personnel and Facilities

Friday, May 31, 2013
The Center for Strategic and International Studies’ Beverly Kirk speaks with Leonard Rubenstein from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health about the alarming attacks in Syria on medical personnel and facilities.

Video: Zaher Sahloul from the Syrian American Medical Society on the Attacks on Medical Personnel and Facilities

Friday, May 31, 2013
Zaher Sahloul from the Syrian American Medical Society talks with the Center for Strategic and International Studies’ Beverly Kirk about the dangers that medical personnel in Syria are facing in the conflict that has claimed thousands of lives and displaced hundreds of thousands.

United Nations Condemns Attacks on Health Workers, Facilities, and Vehicles in Syria

Friday, May 17, 2013
The UN General Assembly adopted a resolution, The situation in the Syrian Arab Republic, condemning human rights violations by Syria. The resolution makes note of attacks on hospitals and stating that the UN “Strongly condemns all attacks and threats of violence against humanitarian and medical personnel and against medical facilities and vehicles, in violation of international law, and the use of medical civilian facilities, including hospitals, for armed purposes, and calls for all medical facilities to be free of weapons, including heavy weapons, consistent with applicable international law.”

Coalition Urges World Health Organization Director-General to Raise Awareness of Attacks on Health Workers

Thursday, May 16, 2013
On May 15 the Safeguarding Health in Conflict coalition sent a letter to World Health Organization Director-General Margaret Chan urging her to include in her World Health Assembly opening address a forceful statement condemning attacks on doctors, nurses, emergency medical personnel, and other health workers, particularly in Syria, which are taking place at an unprecedented level. The letter, which also has the support of the World Medical Association, called attention to a new study by the International Committee of the Red Cross, Violent Incidents Affecting Health Care, which reported that at least 921 violent incidents against health care personnel, infrastructure, and wounded or sick people took place in 2012.

Health Care in Danger: The Human Cost

Wednesday, May 8, 2013
The law says hospitals, ambulances and health-care workers must be protected and should never be targeted as they carry out their regular duties. This is often far from the reality. Worldwide, the lack of safe access to health care is causing untold suffering to millions of people. Through the voices of doctors, nurses, ambulance drivers and patients, this film shows the human cost of violence against health-care workers and facilities.

Taliban Renounces War on Anti-Polio Workers

Monday, May 13, 2013
The Taliban has ended its war on polio vaccination workers and admitted immunisation is the only way to protect children from the disease, its leadership said in a statement issued today. The announcement comes just weeks after the Afghan government launched a new campaign to immunise more than eight million children between six months and five years old throughout the country. It said it had trained 46,000 volunteers to conduct the campaign which is funded by the American aid agency USAID, the World Health Organisation and Unicef.

Violent Incidents against Health Care in at Least 22 Countries in 2012

Wednesday, May 15, 2013
A new study by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), entitled “Violent Incidents Affecting Health Care,” reveals that at least 921 violent incidents against health-care personnel, infrastructure and wounded or sick people took place in 2012. The study conducted in 22 unnamed countries affected by armed violence underlines a worrying trend: assaults on health-care personnel, facilities and vehicles in conflicts and other emergencies leave millions around the world without care just when they need it most.

How Doctors Would Know If Syrians Were Hit With Nerve Gas

Tuesday, April 30, 2013
President Obama affirmed Tuesday that there’s evidence Syrians have been attacked with chemical weapons—in particular, nerve gas. But that's not the same as proof positive. “We don't know how they were used, when they were used, who used them,” Obama said. “We don't have a chain of custody that establishes what exactly happened.”

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