🔗 Share this article The Targeting of Childbirth: The Making of Women and Babies into Casualties in Worldwide Wars. A group of thirty mothers had taken refuge in a maternity hospital in El Fasher, Sudan, at the onset of the horrific violence. Among them were new mothers, while others were experiencing childbirth. Working that night, a 28-year-old lab technician, a technician named Abdo-Rabo Ahmed, became one of the few known survivors. “The sounds of screaming reached me of women and children,” he states. “They executed everybody inside the hospital. We who were able to escape, did so.” This brutal attack stands as one of the most shocking examples in the ongoing war tearing the North African nation apart. Combatants raided the hospital, allegedly slaughtering more than 460 innocent people inside. Rights organizations have labeled it “a crime beyond words,” and a clear case of the vanishing safeguards for civilians trapped in war-torn areas in Ukraine, Gaza, Myanmar, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Sudan. An Unprecedented Assault On Childbirth Services Despite every significant nation have agreed to the international laws of war, which commit them to defending civilians, the past year has experienced a historic high of assaults against medical infrastructure. Women undergoing childbirth are highly exposed due to their dependence on locally available medical care. An investigation of records reveal an alarming level of violence: nearly 300 incidents targeting or hindering 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 Ukraine, Gaza, and Sudan, where a vast number of expectant mothers are stranded. Deaths have occurred, denied medical attention, or made to have their babies in dangerous and unsanitary conditions. The data also indicates that at least 68 childbirth professionals and specialists have been slain, 15 kidnapped, and 101 detained—sometimes while assisting births. A Worldwide Emergency for Mothers and Newborns The numbers are probably a substantial underreporting, as they are limited to incidents documented publicly. In many conflict zones, reporting is limited. Last year, analysis showed that 50% of women who lost their lives in maternal circumstances lived amidst hostilities. This underscores a catastrophic reality. 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 reproductive health rights has been cited by a UN commission as one reason behind accusations of genocidal acts. Despite periods of calm, doctors report that women and children succumb from medical shortages, owing to severe deficits of medicine and equipment. Agencies have reported women delivering babies amidst ruins because hospitals could not be reached. “Our facility has endured missile strikes targeting 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 aiming to influence birthrates. Ukraine's Ordeal Since early 2022, at least 80 maternity and neonatal facilities have been damaged or destroyed in Ukraine. Journalism from conflict zones describe births forced underground and skyrocketing stress leading to maternal health issues. “We are being singled out,” says the head of obstetrics at a repeatedly damaged hospital in Kherson. Russian authorities have denied deliberately targeting civilians. “The reality is, every facility can be under attack now,” states a medical director in Sumy. “When defensive systems shoot down an aircraft, the falling debris could impact a hospital.” Accountability Evaporates For the more than 676 million women living close to deadly warfare, there are few safeguards and even fewer war crimes prosecutions for those attacking childbirth services. This absence of consequences has fostered a “atmosphere of lawlessness,” argues a human rights lawyer. “Assaults against maternal services, like coerced birth or involuntary sterilization, can be understood as 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 rising sharply, especially among children and pregnant women. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, information is scarce because of a communication blackout from rebel-held areas. Nevertheless, shelling in Goma damaged a maternity hospital, killing mothers, babies, and nurses. In Myanmar, hospitals have come under fire 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 preventable with routine care, but war shatters health systems. Rights groups note that fear is now driving women away from facilities once considered safe, pushing them toward risky home births devoid of emergency care. “When childbirth centers become intentional targets points toward a broader and more sinister pattern: the use of violence against hospitals as a weapon to spread fear and to tear apart the social fabric,” notes a legal researcher. “There is no absolute protection for hospitals in war. Under the Geneva conventions, medical facilities are not inviolable if used for acts deemed ‘harmful to the enemy’, which has increasingly been used as a justification.”