Thirty women were huddled for safety in a childbirth facility in El Fasher, Sudan, at the onset of the horrific violence. Several had recently given birth, while others were experiencing childbirth.
Working that night, a 28-year-old lab technician, Abdo-Rabo Ahmed, managed to survive the ordeal. “There were cries of women and children,” he states. “They executed everybody 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. Armed soldiers stormed the facility, reportedly killing more than 460 individuals receiving care and their families.
Rights organizations have called it “an act of unspeakable brutality,” and a prime example of the vanishing safeguards for civilians caught in conflict zones in multiple global hotspots.
A Record of Violence On Childbirth Services
Despite every significant nation have agreed to the international laws of war, which obligate them to protect civilians, the past year has experienced a historic high of assaults against medical infrastructure. Women undergoing childbirth are exceptionally vulnerable due to their dependence on locally available medical care.
Research and compiled data uncover an alarming level of violence: nearly 300 violent acts against maternity care facilities, staff, and pregnant women over the last three years, including at least 119 targeted attacks against hospitals and delivery wards.
“These incidents do not represent natural consequences of war. They represent a pattern of reproductive violence.”
The majority of these attacks have taken place in Ukraine, Gaza, and Sudan, where countless of women bearing children are confined.
Mothers have lost their lives, blocked from reaching help, or forced to give birth in perilous and unsafe environments. The data also indicates that at least 68 childbirth professionals and specialists have been murdered, 15 kidnapped, and 101 detained—sometimes during medical procedures.
A Worldwide Emergency for Mothers and Newborns
The numbers are probably a significant underestimate, as they only include incidents reported in news outlets. In many war-torn areas, information is scarce.
Last year, findings indicated that one in two mothers 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, creating a grave danger to societal repopulation and recovery.
Conditions within Gaza
In Gaza, the devastating effect on reproductive health rights has been cited by a UN commission as part of the basis for genocide allegations.
Even after ceasefires, 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 having children by the roadside because hospitals could not be reached.
“Our facility has endured missile strikes 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 childbirth centers have been attacked and rendered unusable in Ukraine. Reports from frontline hospitals describe births taking place in basements and skyrocketing stress leading to maternal health issues.
“Russia is targeting us deliberately,” claims the head of obstetrics at a repeatedly damaged hospital in Kherson. Russian authorities have denied deliberately targeting civilians.
“The truth of the matter is, every facility is now a potential target,” comments a medical director in Sumy. “If a drone is destroyed, the falling debris could impact a hospital.”
Accountability Evaporates
For the hundreds of millions of women living close to deadly warfare, there are scarce guarantees and even fewer war crimes prosecutions for those assaulting reproductive health.
This absence of consequences has led to a “environment where anything goes,” explains a human rights lawyer. “Violence targeting childbirth, like forced pregnancy or forced sterilisation, may constitute acts of genocide by hindering reproduction.”
Other Conflict Zones
In El Fasher, the area lacked access to humanitarian aid long before the hospital attack, with malnutrition increasing drastically, 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 struck a baby care unit, killing mothers, babies, and nurses.
In Myanmar, clinics have been attacked and dozens of midwives and patients have faced detention, death, or harm over the past two years of civil war.
The End of Safe Deliveries
Most maternal deaths are avoidable with standard medicine, but war destroys healthcare networks. Rights groups note that terror is compelling women away from facilities once considered safe, resulting in risky home births without skilled assistance.
“When childbirth centers become intentional targets speaks to a broader and more sinister pattern: the use of violence against hospitals as a weapon to spread fear and to destroy community bonds,” says 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 ‘militarily advantageous’, which has often been cited as an excuse.”
