Conference addresses the impact of war on health

The deadliest effects of war are often impoverishment and disease, rather than bullets and bombs, a conference at the Royal Society of Medicine was told last week.

“In many war zones, violent deaths are often only a tiny proportion of overall deaths,” Egbert Sondorp, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, told delegates. “Populations face a deterioration of their already poor health status, and excess deaths from infectious diseases will usually outnumber deaths due to direct violence.”

Highlighting a recent survey from eastern Congo, he noted that “of an excess mortality of 2.5 million, only 350 000 were because of direct violence; most died from malnutrition and disease.”

He called for urgent research to inform a coherent approach to complex emergencies—an approach based on health policy one that targets the main killers. “Such evidence may convince agencies to reorient their …