A group of thirty mothers were seeking shelter in a childbirth facility in El Fasher, Sudan, as the slaughter began. Several had recently given birth, while others were in the midst of labor.
On duty during that fateful night, a 28-year-old lab technician, a technician named Abdo-Rabo Ahmed, became one of the few known survivors. “I heard the screams of women and children,” he states. “They executed everybody inside the hospital. Survival meant running for your life.”
This brutal attack stands as among the worst examples in the ongoing war tearing the African nation apart. Armed soldiers forced their way into the building, reportedly killing more than 460 innocent people inside.
Rights organizations have labeled it “a crime beyond words,” and a stark illustration of the collapse in safety for civilians caught in conflict zones in several nations at war.
An Unprecedented Assault Against Maternal Care
Despite every significant nation have agreed to the Geneva conventions, which commit them to defending civilians, the past year has witnessed an unprecedented spike of assaults against medical infrastructure. Expectant mothers are exceptionally vulnerable due to their need for locally available medical care.
An investigation of records uncover an shocking trend: nearly 300 violent acts against places and people associated with childbirth over the last three years, including at least 119 direct strikes on hospitals and delivery wards.
“These are not inevitable outcomes of conflict. They form a deliberate strategy of violence against reproduction.”
The majority of these attacks have taken place in regions embroiled in intense conflict, where hundreds of thousands of pregnant women are trapped.
Mothers have lost their lives, denied medical attention, or forced to give birth in perilous and unsafe environments. The data also indicates that at least 68 childbirth professionals and specialists have been killed, 15 abducted, and 101 detained—sometimes during medical procedures.
The Global Crisis in Maternal Health
Statistics are thought to be a grave undercount, as they are limited to incidents documented publicly. In many war-torn areas, communications are sparse.
Last year, analysis showed that 50% of women who died during pregnancy or childbirth were in a conflict area. This underscores a catastrophic reality.
Apart from fatalities, these attacks are wrecking hospitals and wards, creating a grave danger to societal repopulation and recovery.
Conditions within Gaza
In Gaza, the devastating effect on the right to maternal care has been cited by a UN commission as one reason behind accusations of genocidal acts.
Following truces, doctors report that women and children succumb from medical shortages, owing to desperate lacks of medicine and equipment. Accounts describe women having children by the roadside because hospitals could not be reached.
“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 denied deliberately targeting maternity care or trying to alter birthrates.
Ukraine's Ordeal
Since early 2022, at least 80 childbirth centers have been struck and ruined in Ukraine. Accounts from embattled medical centers describe births occurring in shelters and skyrocketing stress leading to maternal health issues.
“We are being singled out,” asserts the head of obstetrics at a repeatedly damaged hospital in Kherson. Officials from Russia have rejected deliberately targeting civilians.
“The reality is, every facility can be under attack now,” states a medical director in Sumy. “Even if air defence intercepts a drone, the falling debris can strike a hospital.”
A Culture of Impunity
For the more than 676 million women living within range of fighting, there are scarce guarantees and rare trials for atrocities for those assaulting reproductive health.
This lack of accountability has created a “culture of impunity,” argues a human rights lawyer. “Assaults against maternal services, like forced pregnancy or forced sterilisation, may constitute acts of genocide by hindering reproduction.”
Other Conflict Zones
In El Fasher, the area lacked access to humanitarian aid long before the hospital attack, with malnutrition spiking dangerously, especially among children and pregnant women.
In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, information is limited by a inability to report from rebel-held areas. Nevertheless, shelling in Goma hit a neonatal ward, killing mothers, babies, and nurses.
In Myanmar, medical facilities have been bombed and dozens of midwives and patients have been arrested, killed, or injured over the past two years of civil war.
The Collapse of Safe Childbirth
Most maternal deaths are avoidable with standard medicine, but war collapses medical infrastructure. Rights groups note that anxiety is forcing women away from facilities once considered safe, resulting in risky home births lacking professional help.
“If maternity hospitals are being deliberately targeted speaks to a larger and alarming strategy: the use of violence against hospitals as a means of intimidation and to break societal cohesion,” observes a legal researcher.
“Hospitals are not completely safe for hospitals in war. Under the Geneva conventions, medical facilities may forfeit their immunity if used for acts deemed ‘prejudicial to the opposing side’, which has now become a standard defence.”
