Syrian Children Bear the Brunt of Brutal War

Syrian Children Bear the Brunt of Brutal War
A Syrian boy amid dust as a man runs in a street of the northern city of Aleppo following a reported Syrian government forces airstrike on Feb. 21, 2014. (Baraa al-Halabi/AFP/Getty Images)
3/15/2014
Updated:
6/20/2016

One of the saddest things in the world today—a world ravaged by brutal wars—is a child looking out into space, as if asking us, “Why are you doing this to us? We are only children.”

This thought came to my mind as I read a report of the effects of the Syrian war on children, “A Devastating toll: The impact of three years of war on the health of Syria’s children,” prepared by Save the Children, a health and human rights organization working in more than 120 countries.

The reported numbers of suffering children are overpowering: at least 1.2 million children have fled the country, and at least 4.3 million children are in urgent need of health and humanitarian assistance. More than 10,000 children have already lost their lives, and the numbers keep increasing.

Those children killed or maimed are the result not only of bullets and bombs: they are also dying from lack of basic medical care. What has happened is the result of the collapse of the whole health system in the country. Most children today in Syria are even unable to receive vaccination coverage for the most common vaccine-preventable diseases.

Before the conflict, Syria had a good health care system, with a child mortality rate of 15 per 1,000 births, down from 38 per 1,000 births in 1990. The country was on track to reach Millennium Development Goal 4: to reduce the child mortality rate from preventable diseases by two-thirds. The country also had almost universal coverage by skilled birth attendants and a high rate of institutional delivery.

Today those gains, and hopes, are shattered, as is the country’s health care system. Across the country, 60 percent of hospitals and 38 percent of health facilities have been damaged or destroyed, and nearly half the doctors have fled the country. Aleppo, a city that should have 2,500 doctors, now has only 36. As a result, the remaining health facilities and health personnel struggle to cope with the large number of cases, many of whom remain unattended.

Most of the children arriving at health facilities come with injuries resulting from the war ravaging the country. Hospitals and clinics, however, do not have the personnel to take care of them. Many doctors, health personnel, and even patients have come under attack either on the way to health facilities or even inside of them. Many homes are being used as makeshift hospitals, and living rooms have been turned into operating theaters. In addition, the production of drugs has fallen by 70 percent compared to previous levels.

The consequences of these shortcomings are mind-blowing to a person living in a country at peace: newborn babies dying in their incubators because of electricity cuts; children having their limbs amputated because of a lack of equipment and drugs to treat them; children with chronic diseases being left unattended; children and adults being forcibly made unconscious by lack of anesthesia; parents arriving at a hospital or clinic having to hook up their children to intravenous drips because of a lack of medical and paramedical staff.

Vaccine programs in the country have all but collapsed. While during peacetime vaccine coverage was 91 percent it is probably less than 50 percent today. Deadly diseases like measles and meningitis are on the rise. Even polio, which had been eradicated in the country in 1995, is now present in up to 80,000 children across the country, raising concerns about its spreading internationally.

In Syria today, children’s lives are at risk even before they are born. Pregnant women have poor antenatal, delivery, and postnatal care. Ambulances are few and they are frequently stopped by roadblocks and checkpoints on the way to the hospital. As a result, unassisted births have increased dramatically, raising the possibilities for complications. Many women opt for cesarean sections, despite the risks provoked by a lack of drugs and trained personnel.

Syria’s conflict has been fueled by foreign intervention. Leaders of those countries and groups that have provoked the conflict should have the minimum decency to create also the conditions for proper humanitarian and health assistance conditions, particularly for its most vulnerable victims.

César Chelala, M.D., Ph.D., is a global public health consultant for several U.N. and other international agencies. He has carried out health-related missions in 50 countries worldwide. He lives in New York and writes extensively on human rights and foreign policy issues, and is the recipient of awards from Overseas Press Club of America, ADEPA, and Chaski, and recently received the Cedar of Lebanon Gold Medal. He is also the author of several U.N. official publications on health issues.