Syrian regime murders 800 medics
Assad and allies use health care as a war weapon, says study
PARIS // More than 800 health workers have died in “acts of war crimes” in Syria since 2011, including hospital bombings, shootings, torture and executions perpetrated mainly by government-backed forces, researchers said yesterday. The Syrian government and its ally, Russia, have withheld health care purposely, as a weapon of war, according to an analysis published in The Lancet medical journal.
“This weaponisation of health care has translated into hundreds of health workers killed, hundreds more incarcerated or tortured and hundreds of health facilities deliberately and systematically attacked,” it said.
About 15,000 doctors – nearly half the pre-war number – fled the country, leaving hundreds of thousands of civilians without access to basic care.
“An entire region and its people have been decimated while the world has watched. Health and development will take decades to catch up,” said the report, compiled by experts from universities in Beirut, Britain and the United States, as well as the Syrian American Medical Society and Multi-Aid Programmes (Sams), a non-government organisation.
Of the healthcare workers who have died, about one third were doctors, a quarter were nurses and a fifth were paramedics, according to Physicians for Human Rights, a non-profit group.
The rest were pharmacists, medical students, ambulance workers and veterinarians, who were added to the list because they were treating human patients when they were killed.
Shelling and bombing of hospitals and clinics accounted for more than half of the deaths.
The second highest cause of death among medical profes- sionals was shooting, while about 100 were tortured to death and 61 were executed.
The report said that the total figure was only an estimate.
The evidence suggested that the Syrian government targeted medics as a strategy and to an extent never witnessed in war.
The majority of attacks on health facilities were carried out by the Syrian government and its allies.
Last year marked the worst year in terms of attacks on medical facilities. Sams reported an 89 per cent increase from 2015.
Almost a third of Syrians now live in areas with no health workers and another third are in areas with insufficient care.
Nearly half of hospitals have been damaged.
The Kafr Zita Cave Hospital in Hama has been bombed 33 times since 2014, including six times so far this year. M10, an underground hospital in Aleppo, was attacked 19 times in three years before it was razed in October last year. While doctors continue to brave the storm, the report accused international leaders of doing little to stop the crimes.