A group of thirty mothers had taken refuge in a childbirth facility in El Fasher, Sudan, as the slaughter began. Among them were new mothers, while others were experiencing childbirth.
On duty during that fateful night, a 28-year-old lab technician, a technician named Abdo-Rabo Ahmed, managed to survive the ordeal. “The sounds of screaming reached me of women and children,” he explains. “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 protracted internal conflict tearing the African nation apart. Militiamen stormed the facility, reportedly killing more than 460 individuals receiving care and their families.
Rights organizations have called it “a crime beyond words,” and a stark illustration of the vanishing safeguards for civilians living amidst warfare in several nations at war.
A Record of Violence Against Maternal Care
Although world powers have agreed to the Geneva conventions, which require them to safeguard civilians, the past year has witnessed an unprecedented spike of violence targeting health services. Women undergoing childbirth are exceptionally vulnerable due to their reliance on locally available medical care.
Research and compiled data show 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 are not natural consequences of war. They constitute 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 women bearing children are confined.
Deaths have occurred, blocked from reaching help, or forced to give birth in deplorable situations. The data also indicates that at least 68 childbirth professionals and specialists have been slain, 15 taken hostage, and 101 taken into custody—sometimes during medical procedures.
The Global Crisis for Mothers and Newborns
The numbers are probably a significant underestimate, as they only include incidents documented publicly. In many areas of fighting, information is scarce.
Last year, findings indicated that half of all women who perished while pregnant or giving birth lived amidst hostilities. This underscores a catastrophic reality.
Apart from fatalities, these attacks are obliterating hospitals and wards, jeopardizing the future to demographic stability.
Conditions within Gaza
In Gaza, the catastrophic impact on the right to maternal care 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 continue to die from inadequate care, owing to critical shortages of medicine and equipment. Agencies have reported women giving birth in rubble because hospitals could not be reached.
“We’ve had rockets fired at the wards, operating rooms, and maternity wards,” explains the head of a major hospital’s gynecology department. A military spokesperson has contested deliberately targeting maternity care or aiming to influence birthrates.
Ukraine's Ordeal
Since early 2022, at least 80 childbirth centers have been struck and ruined in Ukraine. Journalism from conflict zones describe births occurring in shelters and skyrocketing stress leading to maternal health issues.
“The attacks on us are intentional,” asserts the head of obstetrics at a repeatedly damaged hospital in Kherson. The government has disputed deliberately targeting civilians.
“The reality is, every facility can be under attack now,” notes a medical director in Sumy. “If a drone is destroyed, the falling debris can strike a hospital.”
A Culture of Impunity
For the over half a billion females living within range of fighting, there are few safeguards and even fewer war crimes prosecutions for those attacking childbirth services.
This lack of accountability has fostered a “atmosphere of lawlessness,” says a human rights lawyer. “Violence targeting childbirth, like coerced birth or involuntary sterilization, may constitute 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 inability to report 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
A large proportion of mother deaths are averted with basic healthcare, but war shatters health systems. Rights groups note that anxiety is forcing women away from facilities once considered safe, pushing them toward risky home births without skilled assistance.
“If maternity hospitals are being deliberately targeted points toward a broader and more sinister pattern: the use of attacks on medical facilities as a tool for terror and to destroy community bonds,” observes a legal researcher.
“There is no absolute protection 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.”
