Dozens of women were seeking shelter in a childbirth facility in El Fasher, Sudan, at the onset of the horrific violence. Among them were new mothers, while others were actively in labor.
Working that night, a 28-year-old lab technician, Abdo-Rabo Ahmed, became one of the few known survivors. “The sounds of screaming reached me of women and children,” he states. “A massacre was taking place inside the hospital. Survival meant running for your life.”
This brutal attack stands as one of the most shocking examples in the ongoing war tearing the African nation apart. Combatants stormed the facility, allegedly slaughtering more than 460 individuals receiving care and their families.
Rights organizations have called it “an unspeakable atrocity,” and a prime example of the collapse in safety for civilians trapped in war-torn areas in multiple global hotspots.
A Record of Violence On Childbirth Services
Despite every significant nation are signatories to the international laws of war, which commit them to defending civilians, the past year has witnessed an unprecedented spike of violence targeting health services. Women undergoing childbirth are particularly at risk due to their reliance on locally available medical care.
Data analysis and investigations reveal an shocking trend: nearly 300 violent acts against maternity care facilities, staff, and pregnant women over the last three years, including at least 119 direct strikes on hospitals and delivery wards.
“These incidents do not represent inevitable outcomes of conflict. They constitute a systematic assault on childbirth.”
The majority of these incidents have happened in regions embroiled in intense conflict, where a vast number of pregnant women are trapped.
Mothers have lost their lives, blocked from reaching help, or made to have their babies in perilous and unsafe environments. The data also indicates that at least 68 maternal health workers have been murdered, 15 kidnapped, and 101 arrested—sometimes during medical procedures.
The Global Crisis for Mothers and Newborns
Statistics are thought to be a substantial underreporting, as they are limited to incidents covered by the media. In many war-torn areas, communications are sparse.
Last year, findings indicated that one in two mothers who died during pregnancy or childbirth resided in a war zone. This underscores a horrifying trend.
Beyond killing women and staff, these attacks are destroying critical infrastructure for mothers and babies, posing a long-term threat to community survival.
Conditions within Gaza
In Gaza, the catastrophic impact on reproductive health rights has been cited by a UN commission as a factor in genocide allegations.
Despite periods of calm, doctors report that women and children continue to die from inadequate care, owing to severe deficits of medicine and equipment. UN officials have relayed women having children by the roadside because hospitals were out of reach.
“Direct shelling hitting the wards, operating rooms, and maternity wards,” states the head of a major hospital’s gynecology department. A military spokesperson has rejected deliberately targeting maternity care or seeking to affect 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 skyrocketing stress leading to maternal health issues.
“We are being singled out,” asserts the head of obstetrics at a repeatedly damaged hospital in Kherson. The government has disputed deliberately targeting civilians.
“In fact, every facility is now a potential target,” comments a medical director in Sumy. “Even if air defence intercepts a drone, the falling debris may hit a hospital.”
Accountability Evaporates
For the more than 676 million women living near active conflicts, there are scarce guarantees and rare trials for atrocities for those targeting maternity care.
This lack of accountability has led to a “atmosphere of lawlessness,” explains a human rights lawyer. “Violence targeting childbirth, like forced pregnancy or forced sterilisation, may constitute acts of genocide by hindering reproduction.”
Additional Hotspots
In El Fasher, the area was isolated from humanitarian aid long before the hospital attack, with malnutrition rising sharply, 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 damaged a maternity hospital, causing fatalities among patients and staff.
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
Most maternal deaths are preventable with routine care, but war collapses medical infrastructure. Rights groups note that anxiety is forcing women away from facilities once considered safe, leading them to risky home births lacking professional help.
“If maternity hospitals are being deliberately targeted points toward a broader and more sinister pattern: the use of attacks on medical facilities as a means of intimidation and to destroy community bonds,” observes a legal researcher.
“Safeguards are not guaranteed for hospitals in war. Under the Geneva conventions, medical facilities are not inviolable if used for acts deemed ‘militarily advantageous’, which has often been cited as an excuse.”
