New report supports ICN’s warnings that illegal attacks on health care have become normalized in conflict
The latest report from the Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition (SHCC), Epidemic of Violence, has identified 3,600 attacks on health care around the world in in 2024, marking a 15% increase from 2023 and a 62% rise from 2022. This is the highest number on record, despite the extensive protection enshrined in International Humanitarian Law (IHL).
Last week the International Council of Nurses (ICN), a founding member of the SHCC, raised its concerns about ongoing inhumane treatment and deadly attacks in a range of conflict zones around the world and expressed its alarm at the lack of effective action to bring such attacks to an end and enforce and uphold IHL.
ICN says the evidence in the report is shocking, including that over 1,300 of the 3,600 global attacks took place in Gaza, the highest number ever recorded in a single conflict. The report details a further 2,300 attacks, including hundreds each in Ukraine, Lebanon, Myanmar and Sudan.
ICN Chief Executive Officer Howard Catton said the new SHCC data underlines the severity of the current global situation. He described how many nurses are finding their everyday work environment suddenly transformed into a deadly battlefield from which there is no escape, with health staff and facilities increasing being shot at, bombed, blasted, and destroyed.