[Marxism] Iraqi Health Indices lead to the unescapable conclusion: The Anglo-American occupation of Iraq is a massive WAR CRIME

[Greg McDonald <sabocat59@xxxxxxx>]

Pity the sick of Iraq

Full: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/839/re10.htm

After repeatedly topping the Arab health index, Iraq's health record  
is now worse than ever because of the US-led occupation. The general  
effect on the Iraqi population amounts to a massive war crime, writes  
Bert De Belder*

...Iraq's health status, four years into the occupation, is nothing  
short of disastrous. Iraq's health index has deteriorated to a level  
not seen since the 1950s, says Joseph Chamie, former director of the  
United Nations Population Division and an Iraq specialist. People's  
health status is determined by social, economic and environmental  
factors much more than by the availability of healthcare. Not  
surprisingly, all these factors have deteriorated in the course of  
the occupation....
...THE DEVASTATED HEALTH OF IRAQI CHILDREN: The combination of  
sanctions, war and occupation has resulted in Iraq showing the  
world's worst evolution in child mortality: from an under-five  
mortality rate of 50 per 1000 live births in 1990, to 125 in 2005.  
That means an annual deterioration of 6.1 per cent -- a world record,  
well behind very poor and AIDS- affected Botswana. At the outset of  
the 2003 war, the US administration pledged to cut Iraq's child  
mortality rate in half by 2005. But the rate has continued to worsen,  
to 130 in 2006, according to Iraqi Health Ministry figures...

...Also important is the psychological impact of war and occupation.  
In a study entitled "The Psychological Effects of War on Iraqis", the  
Association of Iraqi Psychologists (AIP) reports that out of 2,000  
people interviewed in all 18 Iraqi provinces, 92 per cent said they  
feared being killed in an explosion. Some 60 per cent of those  
interviewed said the level of violence had caused them to have panic  
attacks, which prevented them from going out because they feared they  
would be the next victims. The AIP also surveyed over 1,000 children  
across Iraq and found that 92 per cent of children examined had  
learning impediments, largely attributable to the current climate of  
fear and insecurity. "The only thing they have on their minds are  
guns, bullets, death and a fear of the US occupation," says the AIP's  
Marwan Abdullah...

HOSPITALS AND CLINICS FACED WITH A CRITICAL LACK OF RESOURCES: On 19  
January 2007, a group of some 100 eminent UK doctors signed a letter  
to British Prime Minister Tony Blair to voice their grave concern  
over the fate of Iraq's children. The statement read: "We are  
concerned that children are dying in Iraq for want of medical  
treatment. Sick or injured children, who could otherwise be treated  
by simple means, are left to die in their hundreds because they do  
not have access to basic medicines or other resources. Children who  
have lost hands, feet, and limbs are left without prostheses.  
Children with grave psychological distress are left untreated."

The Iraq Medical Association reports that 90 per cent of the almost  
180 hospitals in Iraq lack essential equipment. At Yarmouk Hospital,  
one of the busiest hospitals in Baghdad, five people die on average  
every day because medics and nurses don't have the equipment to treat  
common ills and accidents, according to Yarmouk doctor Hussam Abboud.  
That translates to more than 1,800 preventable deaths in a year in  
that hospital alone...

...HOSPITALS SUBJECT TO MILITARY ATTACKS AND OCCUPATION: "The Geneva  
Conventions state that hospitals are and should remain neutral and  
accessible to everybody, particularly civilians. Yet, when it's  
occupied by armed groups or official forces, people don't have this  
free and humanitarian access," says Cedric Turlan, information  
officer for the Coordinating Committee in Iraq (NCCI) NGO. His  
observation is corroborated by numerous reports and sources.

In the first week of November 2006, in Ramadi, some 115 kilometres  
west of Baghdad, 13 civilians entering the hospital to get treatment  
were killed by snipers. Less than 10 per cent of the hospital's staff  
was still working there when US-led forces burst into the hospital  
many times day and night, looking for snipers on the hospital's roof.  
"The multinational forces were outside, surrounding the hospital, but  
they intruded into the hospital on a daily basis," Turlan said. "Now  
people rarely go to the hospital because they fear being shot or  
arrested."...

...GOVERNMENT COMPLICITY IN ATTACKS AND FAILING HEALTH: With current  
Minister of Health Ali Al-Shimari belonging to the political movement  
of Moqtada Al-Sadr, the latter's military arm, the Mahdi Army, is  
acting inside hospitals with impunity. Sick and wounded patients have  
been abducted from public hospitals and later killed. As a  
consequence, more and more Iraqis are avoiding hospitals. "We would  
prefer to die instead of going to the hospital," says Abu Nasr, a  
resident of a Baghdad suburb. "The hospitals have become killing  
fields."

The ministry also appears to discriminate in the provision of  
supplies. Tariq Hiali, a health official in Baqouba (60 kilometres  
northeast of Baghdad), laments that "the Ministry of Health is not  
providing us with medications and medical equipment -- they consider  
us to be terrorists." An employee at Baqouba's blood bank, Jamal  
Qadoori, says: "Ambulances we send to Baghdad are being intercepted  
by the Mahdi Army."...

...HEALTH WORKERS HARASSED, ARRESTED AND ASSASSINATED: Under the  
Fourth Geneva Convention, Article 18 reads: "Civilian hospitals  
organised to care for the wounded and sick, infirm and maternity  
cases, may in no circumstances be the object of attack, but shall at  
all times be respected and protected by the Parties to the conflict."  
On-the-ground reality in Iraq today is quite different.

"A major problem affecting Iraq's health sector is the country's  
desperate security situation," says Nada Doumani, a spokeswoman for  
the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). "Armed men storm  
operating theatres forcing doctors to treat the patients they bring  
as a priority. Some patients insist on keeping their weapons and  
masks while being treated. This creates a traumatising situation for  
the doctors," she says....

...HEALTH WORKERS KIDNAPPED AND HELD FOR RANSOM: As if the daily  
violence was not enough, in the chaos and disorder that reign in  
occupied Iraq, health professionals are also prone to getting  
kidnapped for ransom...

...MASSIVE FLIGHT OF HEALTH PROFESSIONALS: In March 2006, the British  
NGO Medact said that 18,000 out of Iraq's 34,000 physicians had left  
the country since the onset of the war, according to official figures  
from the Iraq Medical Association (IMA). Farouk Naji, a clinician and  
senior member of IMA, declares: "About 2,000 physicians have been  
killed since 2003. The violence has increased and everyday we are  
losing the best professionals in Iraq." In some cases, ambulances  
picking up the injured after explosions are without paramedics or  
nurses, Naji says. "There are not enough professionals and the ones  
available are in hospitals, trying to figure out how to treat  
patients in improvised operating theatres," he adds...

...RECONSTRUCTION UNDER OCCUPATION: A DISMAL FAILURE : Four years  
into the US- led war on Iraq, the country's healthcare system is in a  
shambles. Most hospitals lack basis supplies, dozens of clinics  
remain incompletely constructed, and costly high-technology equipment  
lies idle in warehouses. Since 2003, US agencies may have spent up to  
$1 billion of Iraqi reconstruction funds on healthcare, but no new  
hospitals and only a few local clinics have been built. Even the pet  
project of First Lady Laura Bush -- a $50 million state-of-the-art  
children's hospital in Basra -- is running far behind schedule and  
over budget...

...CRIMINAL NEGLECT: THE OCCUPATION MUST END: Four years after its  
onset, it has become clearer than ever that the US-led war and  
occupation of Iraq have resulted in a massive public health disaster  
for Iraqis. Reversing the current trend of ever-deteriorating health  
conditions requires first and foremost the end of the occupation.

* The writer is coordinator for Medical Aid for the Third World,  
Belgium, and member of the Brussels Tribunal (http:// 
brusselstribunal.org).

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