Health Care

This week I took an online course offered by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) about health care responsibilities in times of conflict. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to consider the ethics of being a health worker in a war situation in today’s disturbing reality of what war is. There is one especially harrowing and dramatic video clip in the course: it shows the 2009 graduation ceremony of a group of Somali doctors—the first to graduate in many years. And as we look at the young doctors, proud in their robes, there is an explosion that cuts off the speaker and the picture—and then the scene is one of bodies everywhere.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on Tuesday called for the urgent removal of obstacles to the delivery to Yemen of vital medical supplies needed to treat casualties from a week of deadly clashes and air strikes. A shipment of ICRC medical supplies sufficient to treat from 700 to 1,000 people was due to arrive by plane on Tuesday for distribution to hospitals across the country that are running low on the means to treat the war wounded. So far, efforts to negotiate the safe arrival of the plane have not been successful.

A humanitarian report to be released Thursday addresses the dire medical situation in Syria and reports how doctors from all over the world—including here in Chicago—are being arrested and tortured simply for trying to save lives. “This is my fifth visit into Aleppo which is considered one of the most dangerous cities in the world, especially for healthcare workers,” said Chicago-area critical care specialist Dr. Zaher Sahloul.

“Working in a field hospital is like death,” said a Syrian general practitioner from Idlib, describing medical practice while under assault from barrel bombs and other attacks. Another doctor from Aleppo recounted, “I cannot forget the sight of amputated limbs, severed heads, and horrible cranial injuries.” These experiences are universal among Syrian health workers, as shown in the new report Syrian Medical Voices from the Ground: The Ordeal of Syria's Healthcare Professionals.

“Let me treat my patients,” pleads a Syrian doctor whose hospital has been repeatedly targeted. Around the world, attacks on health workers and facilities have reached new heights, and this violence affects women disproportionately. More than 75% of the health workforce in many countries is female, and many women are left without access to much-needed health services.