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News, blog posts, and event announcements. Other websites are welcome to cross-post this material with attribution and a link to the original.

Damaged health facility in Turkey
04/01/2019

Although governments have continually declared that attacks on health care are unacceptable, their conduct shows instead that the attacks have become accepted. Today our Chair Len Rubenstein will speak at a special session of the UN Security Council to press governments to end their passivity and act to protect health workers and health care.
03/01/2019

In response to recent protests, the government of Sudan has violently raided health facilities and arrested, detained, and killed health workers. The international community has the responsibility to call attention to these attacks on health care before the crisis escalates.
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02/08/2019

The Sudanese government of President Omar Hassan al-Bashir is detaining doctors and targeting hospitals with tear gas amidst mass protests against the al-Bashir regime. This press release from Physicians for Human Rights demands that the Sudanese government release doctors and health care workers being held unlawfully, provide medical care for detainees in need, and allow medical responders and hospitals to function without threat of violence.
02/08/2019

Recent attacks on healthcare in Sudan amidst the governmental crisis has caused an uprising roar around the world. The International Federation of Medical Students’ Associations condemns attacks on healthcare and demands accountability for all perpetrators whose actions are violating the International Human Rights Law (IHRL) & the International Humanitarian Law (IHL).
02/08/2019

Newsletter from the Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition detailing attacks on health from December 2018 to January 2019. If you have not already, please sign up to our newsletter on this site.
01/29/2019

Physicians for Human Rights condemns the recent sentencing of Dr. Şebnem Korur Fincancı and Dr. Gençay Gürsoy. Dr. Fincancı, sentenced to two years and six months in prison, is a world-renowned forensic medical expert and president of the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey. Dr. Gençay Gürsoy, the founder and former president of the Turkish Medical Association, was sentenced to two years and three months. Sign this petition to the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to have all charges against them dropped.
01/22/2019

Doctors in Sudan are under attack in recent weeks as they are emerging as a leading force in a wave of anti-government protests. The Sudan Doctors’ Syndicate reports, for example, that security forces have shot dead a doctor and attacked hospitals with tear gas and live ammunition. Doctors have also been arrested and injured.
01/21/2019

The functionality of Gaza’s 14 public hospitals is increasingly jeopardized by electricity shortages. Several of the most severely impacted hospitals have already put rationalization measures in place and suspended sterilization, diagnostic imaging, cleaning, laundry and catering services during cut-off hours. Elective surgeries have been further reduced and drastic service reductions, including closures of wards and hospitals, are imminent.Hundreds of patients, including newborn and children, whose life depends on the availability of dialysis services, incubators and ventilators in intensive care units, and other electrical life-sustaining devices, and those requiring surgical interventions will be directly affected. 
12/20/2018

Physicians for Human Rights denounces the sentencing today of Dr. Şebnem Korur Fincancı, a prominent human rights defender and the president of the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey, to two years and six months in prison for signing a peace petition in 2016 organized by a group of Turkish academics.
12/17/2018

Three and a half years of conflict in Yemen have led to the near total collapse of the country’s health system. More than half of health facilities are no longer functional and 16.4 million people do not have access to adequate health services. This advocacy brief by the Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition highlights how attacks on health workers, facilities, and infrastructure—at least 40 this year—have contributed to the cholera outbreak and famine-like conditions and provides recommendations for the parties to conflict, the UN Security Council, and others to avert humanitarian and health catastrophe.

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