Nearly 230 health workers killed in Lebanon amid Israel-Hezbollah conflict: WHO – Firstpost

Nearly 230 health workers have been killed in Lebanon since the start of Israel’s war on Gaza following attacks on October 7 last year, the World Health Organization said on Friday.

In total, the UN health agency said there have been 187 attacks on health care in Lebanon in the more than 13 months of cross-border fire between Israel and Hezbollah over the Gaza conflict.

Between October 7, 2023 and November 18 this year, “we have 226 deaths and 199 injuries in total,” Abdinasir Abubakar, the WHO representative in Lebanon, said via video link from Beirut.

He said “close to 70 percent” of those have occurred since tensions escalated into full-scale war in September.

Calling this “a deeply troubling pattern”, he stressed that “depriving civilians of access to life-saving care and targeting medical providers is a violation of international humanitarian law”.

Abubakar said “a hallmark of the conflict in Lebanon is how destructive it has been to health care,” noting that 47 percent of these attacks “proved fatal to at least one health worker or patient” — the most large percentage of any currently active conflict. .

By comparison, Abubakar said only 13.3 percent of attacks on healthcare globally were fatal in the same period, pointing to data from a range of conflict situations, including Ukraine, Sudan and the occupied Palestinian territory.

He suggested that the high percentage of fatal attacks on health care in Lebanon could be because “more ambulances were targeted.”

“And whenever the ambulance is actually targeted, then you’re going to have three, four or five paramedics … killed.”

The conflict dealt a severe blow to general health care in Lebanon, which had already experienced a series of dire crises in recent years.

WHO has warned that 15 of Lebanon’s 153 hospitals have stopped functioning or are only partially functioning

Hanan Balkhy, WHO regional director for the Eastern Mediterranean region, stressed that “attacks on health care of this scale cripple the health system when those whose lives depend on it need it most.”

“Beyond the loss of life, the death of health workers is a waste of years of investment and a crucial resource for a fragile country going forward.”