Perilous Medicine

The Struggle to Protect Health Care from the Violence of War

Leonard Rubenstein (Director, Program on Human Rights, Health, and Conflict)

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English

Columbia University Press
21 September 2021

Politics & government; Warfare & defence; Health systems & services

Pervasive violence against hospitals, patients, doctors, and other health workers has become a horrifically common feature of modern war. These relentless attacks destroy lives and the capacity of health systems to tend to those in need. Inaction to stop this violence undermines long-standing values and laws designed to ensure that sick and wounded people receive care.

Leonard Rubenstein-a human rights lawyer who has investigated atrocities against health workers around the world-offers a gripping and powerful account of the dangers health workers face during conflict and the legal, political, and moral struggle to protect them. In a dozen case studies, he shares the stories of people who have been attacked while seeking to serve patients under dire circumstances including health workers hiding from soldiers in the forests of eastern Myanmar as they seek to serve oppressed ethnic communities, surgeons in Syria operating as their hospitals are bombed, and Afghan hospital staff attacked by the Taliban as well as government and foreign forces. Rubenstein reveals how political and military leaders evade their legal obligations to protect health care in war, punish doctors and nurses for adhering to their responsibilities to provide care to all in need, and fail to hold perpetrators to account.

Bringing together extensive research, firsthand experience, and compelling personal stories, Perilous Medicine also offers a path forward, detailing the lessons the international community needs to learn to protect people already suffering in war and those on the front lines of health care in conflict-ridden places around the world.

By: Leonard Rubenstein (Director Program on Human Rights Health and Conflict)
Imprint: Columbia University Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm,
ISBN: 9780231192460
ISBN 10: 0231192460
Pages: 416
Publication Date: 21 September 2021
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Acknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction: When the Hospital Is a Battlefield 1. Protection of Health Care in War: A Brief History 2. Denying Care to Enemies 3. Counterterrorism: The Devouring Monster 4. Health Care as a Strategic Target: Syria 5. Recklessness: The Saudi Assault on Yemen 6. Obstruction: The Israel–Palestine Conflict 7. Armed Groups: Threats and Violence by Nonstate Actors 8. Challenges in Making Norms Matter Conclusion: Toward Humanity and Dignity Notes Index

Leonard Rubenstein is professor and director of the Program on Human Rights and Health in Conflict at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. He was previously president of Physicians for Human Rights and is a recognized global expert on violence against health care.

Reviews for Perilous Medicine: The Struggle to Protect Health Care from the Violence of War

Providing health care in contact zones often means delivering such care in the face of looting, fires, shelling, bombing, and plague. Rubenstein takes a deep dive in answering why violence against health care seems to be on the rise. Perilous Medicine is a well-documented series of case studies on such tragic attacks. This colossal work paradoxically demonstrates that repeated occurrences of attacks on health care have normalized the abnormal. At the crux of matter, hospitals in war zones remain the last patch of humanity in a world of utter chaos. -- Joanne Liu, former president of Doctors Without Borders Few people have worked as tirelessly to protect doctors, nurses and other health workers on the frontlines of catastrophes and conflicts as has Leonard Rubenstein, and in this much-needed, eagerly-awaited book he brilliantly details how ruthless leaders, militaries and terrorists deliberately target hospitals, patients and their health workers for destruction, kidnapping and murder. Bravo, Dr. Rubenstein, for speaking truth, however inconvenient it may be for world leaders. -- Laurie Garrett, Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and author of <i>Betrayal of Trust: The Collapse of Global Public Health</i>