The Urgent Call for Global Ceasefires: A Public Health Perspective
“Put armed conflict under lockdown.”
Secretary-General Holds Virtual Press Conference to Release Report on Impact of Call for a Global Ceasefire.
UN Photo/Mark Garten. April 2020.
Canada and 53 countries led the call supporting the UN Secretary General in what may be the most important public health initiative of this pandemic.
Gutteres points out that we face a common enemy in COVID-19, an enemy that strikes the most vulnerable in every country, the women and children, the disabled, marginalized and displaced.
As physicians and health professionals we urge all countries to support this visionary response to a pandemic that is devastating even the most advanced medical systems in the world. Imagine how it will spread like wildfire through a crowded refugee camp with malnourished and desperate people huddled in tents in the mud and cold. What water they have is needed for drinking not for washing hands. Isolation is impossible.
Although the Secretary General does not call for an end to sanctions, the suffering and death caused by the extreme lack of medical capacity of Iran and North Korea to address the COVID-19 pandemic imperils hundreds of thousands in those countries.
An outbreak in a conflict zone would spread quickly to countries including those that might have already begun to recover.
In war-ravaged countries, health care systems have collapsed, doctors and hospitals are often targeted, and this virus will hit combatants and survivors alike. Armed conflict must be stopped and humanitarian aid provided without prejudice immediately.
This call is not a pipe dream. So far 70 countries have signed on to support the Secretary General and twelve ceasefires have been reported.
The Canadian Government is to be congratulated on leading the call for a global ceasefire. No one is safe until everyone is safe.
