Thirty women had taken refuge in a maternity hospital in El Fasher, Sudan, at the onset of the horrific violence. Some had just delivered their newborns, while others were actively in labor.
Working that night, a 28-year-old lab technician, a technician named Abdo-Rabo Ahmed, managed to survive the ordeal. “There were cries of women and children,” he states. “They were killing everyone inside the hospital. We who were able to escape, did so.”
This horrifying event stands as one of the most shocking examples in the ongoing war tearing the North African nation apart. Armed soldiers stormed the facility, reportedly killing more than 460 innocent people inside.
Rights organizations have called it “a crime beyond words,” and a prime example of the collapse in safety for civilians caught in conflict zones in several nations at war.
A Record of Violence On Childbirth Services
While all major powers have signed the international laws of war, which commit them to defending civilians, the past year has experienced a historic high of violence targeting health services. Women undergoing childbirth are particularly at risk due to their need for locally available medical care.
Data analysis and investigations reveal an unprecedented scale of attacks: nearly 300 violent acts against maternity care facilities, staff, and pregnant women over the last three years, including at least 119 bombardments of hospitals and delivery wards.
“This is not standard wartime hazards. They represent a pattern of reproductive violence.”
The majority of these assaults have occurred in regions embroiled in intense conflict, where countless of women bearing children are confined.
Deaths have occurred, denied medical attention, or compelled to deliver in perilous and unsafe environments. The data also indicates that at least 68 childbirth professionals and specialists have been slain, 15 abducted, and 101 taken into custody—sometimes during medical procedures.
A Worldwide Emergency for Mothers and Newborns
These figures likely represent a grave undercount, as they only include incidents documented publicly. In many areas of fighting, reporting is limited.
Last year, it was reported that half of all women who perished while pregnant or giving birth lived amidst hostilities. This underscores a devastating pattern.
Beyond killing women and staff, these attacks are destroying maternal and neonatal care facilities, posing a long-term threat to demographic stability.
The Situation in Gaza
In Gaza, the ruinous consequences on the right to maternal care has been cited by a UN commission as a factor in declaring certain actions a genocide.
Following truces, doctors report that women and children are still perishing from medical shortages, owing to desperate lacks of medicine and equipment. UN officials have relayed women giving birth in rubble because hospitals could not be reached.
“We’ve had rockets fired at 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 seeking to affect birthrates.
Ukraine's Ordeal
Since early 2022, at least 80 childbirth centers have been struck and ruined in Ukraine. Reports from frontline hospitals describe births taking place in basements and extreme psychological pressure leading to problems during delivery.
“Russia is targeting us deliberately,” claims the head of obstetrics at a repeatedly damaged hospital in Kherson. Officials from Russia have rejected deliberately targeting civilians.
“The truth of the matter is, every facility faces the threat of assault,” notes 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 hundreds of millions of women living near active conflicts, there are scarce guarantees and even fewer war crimes prosecutions for those targeting maternity care.
This lack of accountability has led to a “culture of impunity,” argues a human rights lawyer. “Violence targeting childbirth, like forced pregnancy or forced sterilisation, are potentially acts of genocide by hindering reproduction.”
Additional Hotspots
In El Fasher, the area had been cut off from 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 scarce because of a inability to report from rebel-held areas. Nevertheless, shelling in Goma damaged a maternity hospital, resulting in tragic loss of life.
In Myanmar, medical facilities have been bombed and dozens of midwives and patients have suffered violence over the past two years of civil war.
The End of Safe Deliveries
Most maternal deaths are averted with basic healthcare, but war destroys healthcare networks. Rights groups note that anxiety is forcing women away from facilities once considered safe, resulting in risky home births devoid of emergency care.
“The deliberate attack on maternity wards points toward a larger and alarming strategy: the use of violence against hospitals as a means of intimidation and to break societal cohesion,” notes 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 now become a standard defence.”
