Thirty women were seeking shelter in a childbirth facility in El Fasher, Sudan, as the slaughter began. Among them were new mothers, while others were actively in labor.
Working that night, a 28-year-old lab technician, a technician named Abdo-Rabo Ahmed, became one of the few known survivors. “There were cries of women and children,” he states. “They were killing everyone inside the hospital. Those who could run, fled.”
This horrifying event stands as one of the most shocking examples in the protracted internal conflict tearing the North African nation apart. Armed soldiers stormed the facility, leaving dead more than 460 innocent people inside.
Rights organizations have called it “an act of unspeakable brutality,” and a stark illustration of the vanishing safeguards for civilians living amidst warfare in multiple global hotspots.
An Unprecedented Assault On Childbirth Services
Although world powers are signatories to the Geneva conventions, which obligate them to protect civilians, the past year has seen a record number of assaults against medical infrastructure. Mothers in labor are highly exposed due to their reliance on locally available medical care.
Research and compiled data uncover an shocking trend: nearly 300 attacks on and disruptions to places and people associated with childbirth over the last three years, including at least 119 bombardments of hospitals and delivery wards.
“These incidents do not represent standard wartime hazards. They form a pattern of reproductive violence.”
The majority of these assaults have occurred in regions embroiled in intense conflict, where a vast number of expectant mothers are stranded.
Women have been killed, prevented from accessing care, or made to have their babies in deplorable situations. The data also indicates that at least 68 maternal health workers have been slain, 15 abducted, and 101 detained—sometimes in the act of delivering babies.
A Worldwide Emergency in Maternal Health
The numbers are probably a grave undercount, as they capture solely incidents covered by the media. In many conflict zones, reporting is limited.
Last year, analysis showed that one in two mothers who perished while pregnant or giving birth were in a conflict area. This underscores a horrifying trend.
Apart from fatalities, these attacks are obliterating critical infrastructure for mothers and babies, jeopardizing the future to societal repopulation and recovery.
Conditions within Gaza
In Gaza, the devastating effect on reproductive health rights has been cited by a UN commission as part of the basis for accusations of genocidal acts.
Despite periods of calm, doctors report that women and children continue to die from medical shortages, owing to severe deficits of medicine and equipment. UN officials have relayed women giving birth in rubble because hospitals were out of reach.
“We’ve had rockets targeting the wards, operating rooms, and maternity wards,” states the head of a major hospital’s gynecology department. A military spokesperson has contested deliberately targeting maternity care or trying to alter birthrates.
The Crisis in Ukraine
Since early 2022, at least 80 hospitals for mothers and babies have been struck and ruined in Ukraine. Journalism from conflict zones describe births forced underground and extreme psychological pressure leading to birth complications.
“Russia is targeting us deliberately,” asserts the head of obstetrics at a repeatedly damaged hospital in Kherson. Russian authorities have denied deliberately targeting civilians.
“In fact, every facility faces the threat of assault,” states a medical director in Sumy. “If a drone is destroyed, the falling debris can strike a hospital.”
Accountability Evaporates
For the over half a billion females living near active conflicts, there are minimal protections and a stark lack of legal accountability for those targeting maternity care.
This void of justice has fostered a “atmosphere of lawlessness,” explains a human rights lawyer. “Violence targeting childbirth, like coerced birth or involuntary sterilization, can be understood as acts of genocide by preventing births.”
Other Conflict Zones
In El Fasher, the area had been cut off from humanitarian aid long before the hospital attack, with malnutrition increasing drastically, especially among children and pregnant women.
In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, information is restricted due to a inability to report from rebel-held areas. Nevertheless, shelling in Goma hit a neonatal ward, killing mothers, babies, and nurses.
In Myanmar, clinics have been attacked and dozens of midwives and patients have been arrested, killed, or injured over the past two years of civil war.
The End of Safe Deliveries
A large proportion of mother deaths are averted with basic healthcare, but war shatters health systems. Rights groups note that anxiety is forcing women away from facilities once considered safe, leading them to risky home births without skilled assistance.
“The deliberate attack on maternity wards indicates a larger and alarming strategy: the use of violence against hospitals as a tool for terror and to destroy community bonds,” says a legal researcher.
“Safeguards are not guaranteed for hospitals in war. Under the Geneva conventions, medical facilities may forfeit their immunity if used for acts deemed ‘militarily advantageous’, which has often been cited as an excuse.”
