Source: The Lancet

Global health is a graveyard of good intentions. WHO’s Director-General, Tedros Adhanom
Ghebreyesus, gave a widely admired address to the World Health Assembly last week.
He spoke of “the profound consequences of conflict” for health and concluded his speech
with these words: “Unless we seek peace, we will find war. Today, and every day, we
have a choice—we make the choices. And today, and every day, we must choose health
for peace, and peace for health. Peace, peace, peace.” One choice his agency has made
is to erase the existence of over 5 million people from its “comprehensive” assessment
of world health—WHO’s flagship World Health Statistics 2022.

News

Violent and non-violent death tolls for the Gaza conflict: new primary evidence from a population-representative field survey

Posted on | Debarati Guha-Sapir | Eran Bendavid | Håvard Hegre | Jon Pedersen | Khalil Shikaki | Michael Robbins | Michael Spagat | The Lancet

Findings: We estimated 75 200 violent deaths (95% CI 63 600–86 800) between Oct 7, 2023, and Jan 5, 2025, representing approximately 3·4% of the Gaza Strip’s pre-conflict population. Women, children (ie, younger than 18 years), and older people (ie, older than 64 years) comprised 56·2% (95% CI 50·4–61·9) of violent deaths, totalling 42 200 deaths (95% CI 33 100–51 300). We also estimated 16 300 non-violent deaths (12 300–20 200), of which 8540 (4540–12 500) represent excess deaths above pre-conflict projections. The MoH figure for this period (49 090 violent deaths) was 34·7% below our central estimate.

News

Break the selective silence on the genocide in Gaza

Posted on | Ghassan Abu-Sittah | Ilan Pappé | Jonathan Montomoli | Roberto De Vogli | The Lancet

Substantial and well-documented evidence indicates a catastrophic public health emergency in Gaza (appendix pp 1–5), marked by severe food insecurity and alarming levels of malnutrition-related deaths.1 Life expectancy at birth reportedly declined by approximately 35 years in 2024.2 This represents a greater collapse in longevity than that recorded during the genocide in Rwanda, where life expectancy at birth declined from age 42·9 years in 1993 to age 12·2 years in 1994.3

Columns

The Palestinian challenge to US medical ethics

Posted on | Eric Reinhar | Joelle M Abi-Rached | The Lancet

For the past 7 months, the world has been witnessing the murder of health workers, as well as their abduction, torture, execution, and the dumping of their bodies in mass graves; killing of patients in their hospital beds; deliberate bombing of hospitals and clinics; targeted destruction of health and sanitation infrastructure; blockades to humanitarian aid and essential medications during a historic famine manufactured to serve as a weapon of war; and the infliction of conditions designed to be incompatible with life on Palestinians in Gaza.