Medical Facilities Hit By Russia Attack, WHO: Ukraine's Health System Is Lagging And Needs Help

JAKARTA - Ukraine's health system is 'hogging', the World Health Organization (WHO) says, while attacks on medical facilities are forcing UN agencies to reconsider deploying emergency teams over security concerns.

Dr Mike Ryan, executive director of the WHO's health emergencies programme, said health was now the target of hostilities and "part of war strategy and tactics".

In 2022 alone, the WHO said it had verified 89 attacks on health globally, including 43 on Ukraine in the three weeks since Russia launched its invasion.

"We are working very hard with many partners to get an emergency medical team on the ground. But how can we put an emergency medical team on the ground, if the facilities they might want to support are going to be attacked and are going to be bombed, will suffer major damage?," asked dr. Ryan quoted from The National News March 18.

"The health system in Ukraine is teetering, running very well, but it needs to be supported, it needs help, it needs to be provided with basic tools to save lives."

"Part of that is getting a team to support it, but how can you do it with a conscience if the infrastructure that those people are going to support is under direct attack?" his criticism.

The verified attacks in Ukraine, which have killed 12 people and injured 34, included 34 attacks on hospitals and other health facilities, seven on ambulances and 10 on health personnel, the WHO said.

In one of the most shocking examples, a maternity and children's hospital in the southern city of Mariupol was fired upon last week, killing three people, including a child.

further dr. Ryan highlighted international humanitarian law requires those at war not only to refrain from targeting health facilities, but to "specifically take action to avoid attacking or inadvertently destroying" them.

"This issue is more important than bricks and mortar. It's not just about destroying buildings. It's about destroying hope," said Dr Ryan.

"It's about taking away the thing that gives people a reason to live, the fact that their families can be cared for, that they can be healed if they get sick, that they can be cared for if they're injured. This is a most basic human right, and has been directly denied by humans," he said.

"And we're then in a position where we can't send help to those people, because the act of attacking the facility, or not being careful to evade the facility, means we can't send the appropriate help when needed," regrets dr. . Ryan.

Meanwhile, Head of WHO Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said he had succeeded in establishing supply lines for medical aid to many Ukrainian cities, but challenges with access remained.

"Attacks on health care not only endanger lives, they deprive people of much-needed care and undermine an already strained health system," he explained.