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'655,000 Iraqis killed since invasion'

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    '655,000 Iraqis killed since invasion'

    '655,000 Iraqis killed since invasion'

    Sarah Boseley, health editor
    Wednesday October 11, 2006
    The Guardian

    The aftermath of a Baghdad bomb attack - a study published in the Lancet estimates that 655,000 Iraqis have died as a result of the war.

    The death toll among Iraqis as a result of the US-led invasion has now reached an estimated 655,000, a study in the Lancet medical journal reports today.

    The figure for the number of deaths attributable to the conflict - which amounts to around 2.5% of the population - is at odds with figures cited by the US and UK governments and will cause a storm, but the Lancet says the work, from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, has been examined and validated by four separate independent experts who all urged publication.

    In October 2004, the same researchers published a study estimating that 100,000 Iraqis had died as a result of the war since the beginning of the March 2003 invasion, a figure that was hugely controversial. Their new study, they say, reaffirms the accuracy of their survey of two years ago and moves it on.

    "Although such death rates might be common in times of war, the combination of a long duration and tens of millions of people affected has made this the deadliest international conflict of the 21st century and should be of grave concern to everyone," write the authors, Gilbert Burnham and colleagues.

    "At the conclusion of our 2004 study we urged that an independent body assess the excess mortality that we saw in Iraq. This has not happened. We continue to believe that an independent international body to monitor compliance with the Geneva conventions and other humanitarian standards in conflict is urgently needed. With reliable data, those voices that speak out for civilians trapped in conflict might be able to lessen the tragic human cost of future wars."

    The epidemiological research was carried out on the ground by teams of doctors moving from house to house, questioning families and examining death certificates. Between May and July this year, they visited 1,849 households in 47 separated clusters across the length and breadth of Iraq. The doctors asked about deaths among members of the household in a period before the invasion, from January 2002 to March 2003, and about deaths since. In 92% of cases, they were shown death certificates confirming the cause.

    A total of 629 deaths were reported, of which 547 - or 87% - occurred after the invasion. The mortality rate before the war was 5.5 per 1,000, but since the invasion, it has risen to 13.3 per 1,000 per year, they say. Between June 2005 and June 2006, the mortality rate hit a high of 19.8 per 1,000.

    Thus they calculate that 654,965 Iraqis have died as a consequence of the invasion. It is an estimate and the mid-point of a range of numbers that could equally be correct in the context of their statistical analysis. But even the lowest number in the range - 392,979 - is higher that anyone else has suggested. Of the deaths, 31% were ascribed to the US-led forces. Most deaths were from gunshot wounds (56%), with a further 13% from car bomb injuries and 14% the result of other explosions.

    "Since 2004, and especially recently," writes the Lancet editor, Richard Horton in a commentary, "independent observers have recognised that the security situation in Iraq has deteriorated dramatically." The new study, he continues, "corroborate the impression that Iraq is descending into bloodthirsty chaos".

    Yet, he writes, "absolute despair would be the wrong response. Instead, the disaster that is the west's current strategy in Iraq must be used as a constructive call to the international community to reconfigure its foreign policy around human security rather than national security, around health and wellbeing in addition to the protection of territorial boundaries and economic stability.

    "Health is now the most important foreign policy issue of our time. Health and wellbeing - their underpinning values, their diverse array of interventions and their goals of healing - offer several original dimensions for a renewed foreign policy that might at least be one positive legacy of our misadventure in Iraq."

    -----------

    $500 bln spent and counting: could have financed cure for cancer, AIDS, multiple flights to Mars and base on the moon and the rest to pay off some national debt.

    #2
    but don't forget we're living in a safer world now...

    Older and ...well, just older!!

    Comment


      #3
      Most of them were killed by other Iraqis.
      His heart is in the right place - shame we can't say the same about his brain...

      Comment


        #4
        Originally posted by Mordac
        Most of them were killed by other Iraqis.
        I understand that, paradoxically, many of them were adherents of some highly tolerant and peace loving religion or other.

        Comment


          #5
          Have the grauniad got an axe to grind?

          Comment


            #6
            Originally posted by Mordac
            Most of them were killed by other Iraqis.
            Yes, that's because the occupiers shifted bulk of fight to local forces who would take the hit for them - otherwise losses would have been unacceptable.

            The point is that this level of violence did not happen during Saddam, and come to think of it if deal was made with him then he could have been good ally against Iran: exactly the job he was doing pretty well in the last 20 years.

            Comment


              #7
              Originally posted by wendigo100
              Have the grauniad got an axe to grind?
              same story is in BBC news

              Still., who didn't see this bloodbath coming before any US troops even stepped on Iraqi soil?
              Coffee's for closers

              Comment


                #8
                Originally posted by Spacecadet
                same story is in BBC news

                Still., who didn't see this bloodbath coming before any US troops even stepped on Iraqi soil?
                Cue "Mailman"!

                Comment


                  #9
                  Originally posted by Spacecadet
                  same story is in BBC news

                  Still., who didn't see this bloodbath coming before any US troops even stepped on Iraqi soil?
                  Errm...

                  1) The US Government + CIA "didn't see it"

                  2) The British Government + MI6 "didn't see it"

                  3) Military Planners of both US and UK Governments "didn't see it".

                  Every other fecker (individual or Nation State) who was outraged at the actions of the runaway US and UK attack train, and the fairly obvious conclusions of same, were totally were ignored.

                  It seems everyone else could guess pretty accurately at the awful bloodshed and chaos that would ensue from this reckless adventure, except for the two "World Powers" who were in the best position to know.

                  I don't think any further analysis is necessary, really.

                  You've come right out the other side of the forest of irony and ended up in the desert of wrong.

                  Comment


                    #10
                    at least they "saw" the WMD
                    Coffee's for closers

                    Comment

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