A senior doctor has issued an appeal for global steps to protect health care workers from violence and aggression.
The call was made at the World Health Assembly in Geneva yesterday as delegates heard about the rising rate of attacks on health facilities.
Fuelled by the conflict in Syria, some 300 attacks against health facilities were recorded last year in 20 countries. There were 600 incidents in 19 countries over the previous two years.
Dr Ardis Hoven, chair of the World Medical Association, set out the measures need to provide protection to doctors, patients and health staff.
He said hospitals and clinics must be free of weapons – and must not be used as weapons of war.
There should also be widespread legal protection for health workers against verbal or physical attacks, he said.
Dr Hoven told delegates: "The decreasing threshold for using violence in civil situations is a question that points directly to the social determinants of health. They must come more into our focus.
"We must learn what the underlying reasons are for this trend to use more violence."
Speaking to the Assembly, the outgoing World Health Organisation general secretary Dr Margaret Chanthe said the "alarming frequency of attacks on health facilities and aid convoys made a mockery of international humanitarian law.
"We condemn all these attacks on health care facilities and workers."
* A British doctor, Dr David Nabarro, will learn today if he has been elected to success Dr Chan. He is one of three doctors short-listed for the senior WHO job.
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