Iraq's Health Care Under the Occupation

By GHALI HASSAN

Since the US military invasion and occupation of Iraq, Iraq's health care system has deteriorated as a result of deliberate destruction by the US administration. The most vulnerable victims of this destruction are the Iraqi children, particularly children under the age of five.

A detailed new study by the British-based charity organisation (Medact) that examines the impact of war on health, revealed cases of vaccine-preventable diseases were rising and relief and reconstruction work had been mismanaged. Gill Reeve, the deputy director of Medact who released the report said, "[t]he health of the Iraqi people has deteriorated since the 2003 invasion ... The 2003 war not only created the conditions for further health decline, but also damaged the ability of Iraqi society to reverse it".

A second report, to be released soon, revealed that acute malnutrition among Iraqi children between the ages of six months and 5 years has increased from 4% before the invasion to 7.7% since the US invasion of Iraq. In other words, despite the 13-years sanctions, Iraqi children were living much better (by 3.7%) under the regime of Saddam Hussein than under the Occupation.

The report, which was conducted by the Norway-based Institute of Applied International Studies, or Fafo, in cooperation with the Iraq's Central Office for Statistics and Information Technology, Iraq's Health Ministry, and the UN Development Program (UNDP), shows that about 400,000 Iraqi children are suffering from 'wasting' and 'emaciation' ­ conditions of chronic diarrhoea and protein deficiency.

A recent UNICEF report shows that, "[b]efore 1990 and the imposition of sanctions, Iraq had one of the highest standards of living in the Middle East". Now UNICEF reports, "at least 200 children are dying every day. They are dying from malnutrition, a lack of clean water and a lack of medical equipment and drugs to cure easily treatable diseases". The UNICEF report shows that, child mortality was not getting any better since the conflict started in 2003 and that the death rate among children was rising.

UNICEF estimates that there are about 6,880 deaths of children under the age of five every year in Iraq, with an under-fives mortality rate of 125 per 1,000 live births. Furthermore, the mortality rate of Iraqi women during pregnancy and childbirth has reached three times the rate reported during the period between 1989 and 2002, a study by the United Nations Population Fund reported.

A medical delegation from the American Friends Service Committee found that years of sanctions "have had their severest impact on families and children there, producing a generation of young people weakened by disease, isolated from the outside world and left to feed on feelings of bitterness and injustice". In its report, the delegation noted that, "the consequences of the sanctions fall most heavily on children. While adults can endure long periods of hardship and privation, children's physiological immaturity and vulnerability provide them with less resistance. They are put at greater risk and are less likely to survive persistent shortages" of food and health care.

Earlier report by the UN stated that before the first US war, "Iraq had an extensive national health care network. Primary care services were available to 97% of the urban population and 71% of the rural population". Every Iraqi citizen had the right to free health care provided by the government. In 1991, Iraq had 1,800 primary health centres, according to the UN children's agency UNICEF.

As a result of US war and sanctions, a decade later that number had fallen to 929, of which a third require serious rehabilitation, one of the most pressing needs to date.

The US-British sponsored sanctions and wars against the Iraqi people have killed more than 2 million Iraqi civilians, a third of them were children under the age of five. Iraq's health care and education systems were deliberately targeted for destruction.

Under the US-UN imposed sanctions, Iraq's public health care system has eroded at every level. Life-saving medical supplies such as chemotherapy drugs, antibiotics, vaccines etc., are either banned or delayed under the dual-use policy. Medical equipments that Iraq was allowed to import were either blocked from delivery by US-Britain or the shipments were almost invariably incomplete and of unusable quality.

Using the usual mask of the UN, "the US had prevented the normal importation of indispensable items of equipment for more than a decade" wrote Tom Nagy of George Washington University. In his research on the effect of sanctions on Iraq's water and the health care system, Nagy found that the US "intentionally destroying whatever had remained of Iraq's water system within six months by using sanctions to prevent the import of a mere handful of items of equipment and chemicals" that are vital for the treatment of water.

During the US assault on Fallujah, US forces cut off water and electricity to the city of 300,000 people. US air strikes have destroyed hospitals and medical centres. The US took over the Fallujah General Hospital and converted to a military hospital, thus denying the citizens of Fallujah any health care service. On 09 November 2004, US warplanes attacked the Nazzal Emergency Hospital in the centre of the city and completely destroyed it. Thirty-five patients were killed, including five children under the ages of 10 years. According to Amnesty International, "20 Iraqi medical staff [doctors and nurses] and dozens of other civilians were killed when a missile hit a Fallujah clinic on 09 November 2004". The air strike also destroyed the hospital medical supplies warehouse. The destruction of Fallujah is a crime against humanity.

As of today, the exact number of civilians killed by the US assault on Fallujah is not known. According to an official in the Allawi's puppet "government", "more than 2085" Iraqis have been killed. US forces used internationally banned weapons such as napalm, phosphorous weapons and jet fuel, which makes the human body melt, to attack the city in violation of international law. Medact has also called on US forces to re-evaluate the use of these illegal weapons in populated areas, given the high rate of civilian casualties.

The Iraqi Red Crescent Society was prevented by US forces from entering the city to provide supplies to the wounded civilians, and called the health conditions in and around Fallujah "catastrophic". Eyewitnesses say most of the victims are civilians, including, women, children, and unarmed men between the ages of 14-60 years old, who were prevented from leaving the city before the US onslaught. Furthermore, many children have died as a result of starvation, dehydration and outbreaks of diarrhoeal infections. UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy said that the death of was "an unconscionable slaughter of innocents". "The killing of children is a crime and a moral outrage", Bellamy added.

Medact says: "The war is a continuing public health disaster that was predictable - and should have been preventable". It added that, "[e]xcess deaths and injuries and high levels of illness are the direct and indirect results of ongoing conflict". According to the Medact, Iraq had also experienced an alarming recurrence of previously well-controlled communicable diseases, including acute respiratory infections, diarrhoea and typhoid, particularly among children.

The Medact study found that, "[o]ne in four people in Iraq were now dependent on food aid, and there were more children underweight or chronically malnourished than before the US invasion". The near disappearance of immunisation programmes had contributed to the recurrence of death and illness from preventable disease, and infant mortality rose due to a lack of access to skilled help in childbirth, as well as to violence, confirming the Fafo report.

The Fafo report paints a catastrophic picture of Iraq's health care under US Occupation. "It's in the level of some African countries", Jon Pedersen, deputy-managing director of the Norway-based Institute told The Associated Press. "Of course, no child should be malnourished, but when we're getting to levels of 7 to 8 percent, it's a clear sign of concern", he added.

Like the Fafo report, the Medact study specifically blames the US Occupation for the deteriorating conditions in Iraq's health and the tactics of the US-led occupying forces for exacerbating the country's health problems, particularly the decision to sideline the UN. Unreliable supplies of electricity have made it hard to boil water for safe drinking. The destruction of Iraq's infrastructure, including the sewage and water systems has exacerbated the problem and led to increase in outbreaks of virulent diseases such as hepatitis. More that 20% of urban residents and 60% of rural Iraqis don't have access to clean water, as a result of the destruction of Iraq's infrastructure. According to the Medact report: "twelve percent of Iraq's hospitals were damaged during the war and the country's two main public health laboratories were also destroyed".

In order to foster the sale Iraqi assets and resources, the US must render them useless first. The deliberate targeting of Iraq's health care system for destruction is part of the illegal armed conquest of Iraq. The objective is quite clear: the cheap sale of Iraqi assets and resources to US corporations.

The US is unable to provide all Iraqis with acceptable and equal health care. Health care in the US is worse than any of the developing countries, with appalling statistics. The US is one of the few countries in the world that does not provide universal health care for children and pregnant women. Infant mortality, low birth weight, and child deaths under five are ranked among the highest in the U.S. as compared to Western industrial nations and Japan.

According to Gill Reeve, of Medact: "Immediate action is needed to halt this health disaster". The best and lasting solution to the humanitarian catastrophe in Iraq is for the US to stop the violence against the Iraqi people, withdraw its forces from Iraq, and restoration of Iraq's sovereignty. The current interim US-appointed "government" is illegitimate. Iraq's sovereignty should be restored to ensure the peaceful rehabilitation of Iraq's infrastructure and health care system.

Ghali Hassan lives in Perth Western Australia: He can be reached at e-mail:
G.Hassan@exchange.curtin.edu.au

Notes:

(1) Medact study:

http://www.medact.org/

Original source: http://www.counterpunch.org/hassan12012004.html

US Officials Face Iraq War Crimes Case in Germany

BERLIN, November 30 (IslamOnline.net) - A US advocacy group will file war crimes charges in Germany on Tuesday, November 30, against US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other senior officials involved in the Abu Ghraib torture scandal.

“German law in this area is leading the world,” Peter Weiss, vice president of the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), a human rights group, was quoted as saying in Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper's Tuesday edition.

Those to be named in the criminal complaint to be filed at Germany's Federal Prosecutors Office by the group and four Iraqi victims include Rumsfeld, CCR said on its website.

Former Central Intelligence Agency chief George Tenet and former top US commander in Iraq Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez and eight other officials are also named in the case.

The Washington Post said Saturday, June 12, that Sanchez, gave free reign to US officers in charge of Abu Ghraib prison to adopt various torture and abuse tactics used at the U.S. detention center in Guantanamo.

The American New Yorker magazine also disclosed on May 16 that the torture at Abu Ghraib was Okayed by U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

Historic Effort

The US advocacy group called it a historic effort to hold high-ranking US officials accountable for “brutal acts of torture including the widely publicized abuses carried out at Abu Ghraib.”

The four Iraqis were “victims of gruesome crimes including severe beatings, sleep and food deprivation, hooding and sexual abuse.”

The group called in an online petition on supporters for filing the criminal complaint to write the German prosecutor in support of the investigation.

“It is critical that he hear from as many people as possible so he feels worldwide pressure to pursue the case,” read the petition.

The group said that under the doctrine of universal jurisdiction suspected war criminals may be prosecuted irrespective of where they are located.

The US came under heavy fire after the Abu Ghraib scandal was first revealed by the American press and after major General Antonio Taguba said in a report that he found evidence of "sadistic, blatant and wanton criminal abuse" at the notorious prison.

Cases of abuse that were reported include a detainee who was shoved to the ground before a soldier stepped on his head; a man was forced to stand naked while a female interrogator made fun of his genitals, and a woman who was repeatedly kicked by a military police guard.

Guantanamo Petitions

CCR is moving towards another effort to organize attorneys to file habeas corpus petitions in the Washington federal court on behalf of the detainees at Guantanamo Bay.

The first five were filed on July 2, 2004. CCR currently represents 53 individuals who have been held at Guantanamo for over two years.

Responding to the Supreme Court's historic decision on the rule of law in Guantanamo Bay, CCR is spearheading the effort to get detainees their day in court; the legal community is stepping up to provide the detainees with the basic right to challenge their detention, the group said on its website.

Amnesty International condemned in May last year US breaches of international law in Guantanamo under the cloak of its so-called global war on terror.

The New York-based Human Rights Watch had called on the Bush administration to promptly investigate and address charges of torture of the Guantanamo detainees or risk criminal prosecution.

Also in January last year, Amnesty asked Washington to resolve the "legal limbo" of the detainees, slamming its continuing defiance of international law.

The accusations shed a light on the US record of human rights.

The US and its allies were reported to have been running a wanton global network of detention camps allowing the U.S. to fly so-called terror suspects to other countries where they are tortured for information.

Original source: http://www.islamonline.net/English/News/20...article01.shtml

Rebels return to 'cleared' areas

In Fallujah, US forces are going through 50,000 houses one by one. But Iraqi insurgents are coming back.

By Scott Peterson | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

FALLUJAH, IRAQ - The embers in the house were still hot from the fire of battle when Cpl. Joshua Richard went in to view the remains of the insurgents who killed a fellow US marine.

At the base of the stairs - the same dark place where Lance Cpl. Blake Magaoay of Pearl City, Hawaii, had fallen in a burst of rifle fire - Corporal Richard harangued the burnt Iraqi corpse."You got what you wanted, didn't you?" he sneered, referring to the Marine casualties.

The corporal's anger is not unusual among marines who for three weeks have been taking casulties among comrades, as they continue to face an up-close battle in Fallujah. The Pentagon now says US forces will see their tour of duty extended until after the Jan. 30 elections. While their fight is no longer a front-page story, the physical and mental toll is growing, as the marines here continue to hunt an enemy that rarely seeks them out. Instead, pockets of insurgents lie waiting until teams - like that led by Corporal Magaoay - come crashing through their door.

Magaoay's death brings the US fatality toll in November to at least 134, one short of the toll of the most lethal month to date for Americans in Iraq. Seventy-one US troops died retaking the rebel-held city, according to Lt. Gen. John F. Sattler, the top Marine commander in Iraq. An additional 623 American troops were wounded in the most intense urban conflict for US forces since the Vietnam War.

Iraqi civilians are not expected to be permitted to begin returning to the badly damaged city until mid-December, and extensive damage to virtually every house and building across Fallujah means that detailed US and Iraqi government plans for rebuilding will take months, at least, to realize.

But the original problem persists: US forces sweep through one neighborhood after another, only to find insurgents popping up in "cleared" areas.

The battle Monday killed one marine and wounded three others - a high cost against three insurgents, who had moved into a house 50 feet across the street from a newly established marine position at a Fallujah fire station. That house and several others nearby had been cleared just two days earlier.

The ensuing fight revealed an enemy that has hardly given up and is making US forces learn the lesson of the warning taped up on the inside gate of the Marine fire station base: "Complacency kills."

"They are in survival mode, and they're just waiting until someone comes to them [to fight], rather than going out and initiating attacks," says Lt. Col. Dan Wilson, the deputy current operations officer for the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force in charge of western Iraq.

"We have to go through close to 50,000 structures in the town of Fallujah," Colonel Wilson says, "to make sure that when someone comes home [an insurgent] doesn't jump out from a hidden wall or a spider hole, kills them, and continues to operate from that house."

Marines are pursuing insurgent cells, and have picked up cell leaders who are "making mistakes" because they are "on the run," adds Wilson.

General Sattler says that at least 1,200 insurgents had been killed in the city. The amount of weaponry found so far in Fallujah confirms to marines that the city had been the nationwide hub of the Iraq's insurgency.

Catalogued so far, US intelligence officers say, are more than 4,500 mortar systems, 400 grenades, 800 rocket-propelled grenades, 800 land mines, and more than 260,000 rifles and small arms.

"You could issue one [Fallujah] rifle to every man in the United States Marine Corps, and still have a bunch left over," says Wilson.

Senior officers say attacks in the Fallujah area have dropped off 44 percent since the invasion of the city began.

A chemical workshop that appeared designed to boost the explosive power of roadside bombs has also been found.

The Fallujah assault "is not good for the families and marines who have suffered and died, putting their lives on the line for the freedom of Iraq. But it has been good in terms of dealing a blow to the insurgency," says Wilson.

That message hadn't gotten through to the three insurgents who killed Magaoay. The insurgents, armed with assault rifles and pineapple grenades, had set up one sleeping area on each floor. Upstairs, they blocked the window with a bedding material and created a small, dark cubbyhole. A book lay on one mattress on the floor.

The marines estimate the insurgents had been in the house less than 12 hours. A bar of soap in the bathroom was still wet with use, immediately after the firefight.

One burst from the rebel rifle - and the toss of a hand grenade heralded the start of battle. Lance Cpl. Chris Anderson, a Marine scout from Tucson, Ariz., watched the grenade roll before it exploded. Shrapnel struck his left hand and shoulder.

"They knew where to place themselves in that house," Lance Corporal Anderson said later at a combat hospital. Magaoay's fate was not immediately clear, so marines used nonlethal stun and flash-bang grenades to fight their way back into the house to find him. Another team was led, in a split-second decision when others hesitated to enter, by Lance Cpl. Edward Lonecke, from Manchester, Ga. He was shot in the thigh, the moment he stormed in from the kitchen door.

"I knew if we could get Magaoay [out], we could blast the place," Lance Corporal Lonecke said later, as he waited for an evacuation flight to Germany. Once the marines pulled out, the house was pummeled with rockets and 25mm explosive rounds.

It was after the flames died down, that Corporal Richard, of Lafayette, La., returned, took snapshots, cursed the dead insurgents, and spat on their corpses.

Upstairs, an intelligence officer gingerly picked through the pockets of the bodies for evidence. His fingers came to rest on a steel pin, and a familiar shape: a final surprise left for the Americans by the suicidal insurgent.

"Grenade!" shouted the officer, leaning over the corpse. The marines dashed for the doorway.

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From CSMonitor:

If you have a moment to step back and take
a look at the whole mess...follow me...and
I'll explain why I don't believe we can
"win" in Iraq. Then I'll disappear again.
My problem is that I've been on this ground
before, and it ain't like the academic debates.
I know to walk around a hole without a bottom...
.................

The U.S. can’t win in Iraq because what we
claim we seek is an Iraqi Democracy by our
definition. That definition does not accept
anyone now fighting the occupation as
combatants, much less participants in any
Iraqi Democracy.

That is shown by the Attorney-General
nominee’s memos removing the protection
of the Geneva Conventions from those we
capture.

It’s shown by generals, secretaries of this and
that calling them terrorists, thugs, foreign fighters,
dead-enders, and murderers. The commander in
Mosel called the suicide bomber and his pals
“murderers” on CNN today.  I wonder what they call us?

One thing for sure is that those who fight the U.S.
will have a say in the future of Iraq. They are the
hardcore, dedicated, never-say-die guys who will
not give up. Not to us, not to any new government.

How then can we expect the more passive Iraqis
to shoulder the weight of an army to fight them?
How can we expect Iraqis to take up arms against
an insurgent cadre we can not control?

Every day we harden them, just as we hardened
the VC. They have to get hard to resist overwhelming
firepower. We are not able to isolate and kill them.

The argument that we must “win” to justify the loss of
troops is as nuts now as it was in Vietnam. Losing
more in a futile effort to justify prior losses is nuts.

The Mosel commander said today he has plenty of
American troops, he just needs more Iraqi troops.
Duh! You can’t command them chief, hell you
can’t hardly find them unless the bonuses are high.
Then they split, or turn on us, when the shooting
starts.

I could be wrong. The U.S. might suddenly call for
peace talks and offer power and influence in a new
government to the rebels. But, then we’d have to
accept them as combatants, you don’t negotiate
with murderers. There’s the rub.

The only way to stop the war long enough to hold
an election is to include “the enemy” in the process.
And now they have organized and expect to be addressed
as a group with power, not a bunch of individual voters.

Can you say faux election, withdrawal and Civil War?
With the current mindset, the only decision we have is: when?

I wonder what verbal gymnastics Bush will find to explain
away the loss of troops, the loss of civilians, the destruction
of the country? I guess it won’t be any crazier than saying
we are “spreading peace”.
.......................
Now back to the day-to-day details, the mind numbing
occurrances, which are collectively called "The Battle
for Iraq", or "Operation Iraqi Freedom", by CNN and FOX
respectively. I call it Quicksand man, Quicksand Land.

Southerners have long loved
the Uncle Remus stories of
Brer Rabbit and Brer Fox.
One of the best was "The
Tar Baby". Which when fought
became a hopeless quagmire.

Looking at Iraq it's an
obvious analogy.

The Mosel commander said today he has plenty of American troops, he just needs more Iraqi troops. Duh! You can’t command them chief, hell you can’t hardly find them unless the bonuses are high. Then they split, or turn on us, when the shooting starts.

I could be wrong. The U.S. might suddenly call for peace talks and offer power and influence in a new government to the rebels. But, then we’d have to
accept them as combatants, you don’t negotiate with murderers. There’s the rub.

SUPPORT THE TROOPS = TELL THE TRUTH