The World Health Organisation recorded 2,815 attacks on <a href="https://healthylife7.com/corporatisation-of-healthcare-is-on-the-rise-in-nz-with-likely-impacts-on-access-and-quality-of-services/” title=”Corporatisation of healthcare is on the rise in NZ – with likely impacts on access and quality of services”>healthcare in Ukraine between the February 2022 full-scale invasion and the end of 2025, with the vast majority involving violence with heavy weapons
Doctors Without Borders (MSF) condemned what it called Russia’s “deliberate strategy to destroy the healthcare system” in Ukraine on Monday, documenting a consistent pattern of attacks throughout the war
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MSF said that between April 2022 and December 2025, it had documented more than 20 attacks on facilities associated with the medical charity
Russia has launched “relentless attacks on healthcare facilities and medical staff in Ukraine,” MSF said in a statement
These “appear to constitute a deliberate strategy to destroy the healthcare system and collectively punish the population, rather than being an incidental consequence of Russia’s invasion,” it said
The World Health Organisation (WHO) recorded 2,815 attacks on healthcare in Ukraine between the February 2022 full-scale invasion and the end of 2025, with the vast majority involving violence with heavy weapons, and 2,319 attacks impacting facilities
The totality of the attacks resulted in 224 deaths and 902 injuries, the WHO said, which records attacks but does not attribute blame
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s health ministry says that Russian forces have damaged or destroyed more than 2,500 medical facilities during that same period, with 327 completely destroyed
“These attacks are too consistent, too frequent and too precise to be accidental,” Robin Meldrum, MSF’s country coordinator in Ukraine, said in the statement
“When hospitals are struck repeatedly, when ambulances are targeted with precision drones, when medical workers are killed whilst en route to delivering medicines in clearly marked vehicles – this is no coincidence
“This is a pattern; patterns are driven by intent.”
Rising drone attacks
Attacks on medical infrastructure have created a crisis in access to healthcare for people needing non-emergency treatment or treatment for chronic conditions, MSF said
The medical humanitarian organisation said this directly translated into suffering and even death from manageable conditions like cardiovascular disease, diabetes and epilepsy
Healthcare facilities that remain operational are severely understaffed, with the number of doctors in an MSF-supported hospital in Kherson falling by 66% since 2022
Meanwhile MSF teams in eastern and southern Ukraine are working under the “constant threat” of First-Person View (FPV) drone attacks, which allow operators to identify and strike targets with precision in real time
It said that on 29 September last year, a nurse and a director from an MSF-supported health centre were struck by a Russian FPV drone in Lyman as they delivered medicines in a clearly marked vehicle
The non-governmental organisation said its medical staff near the front line were witnessing how drone warfare is rapidly outpacing the medical response
“Whereas injuries were once predominantly caused by artillery, drone strikes now account for a growing proportion of trauma cases,” it said
These attacks result in multiple victims with multiple simultaneous wounds, higher infection rates and rising rates of sepsis, it added
MSF called on all parties to uphold their obligations under international humanitarian law and urged states with influence over Russia to demand an end to attacks on health facilities
It also called on the UN Security Council to investigate and publicly condemn attacks on healthcare
MSF had the equivalent of 414 full-time staff in Ukraine in 2024, with a budget of €15.6 million
It carried out 75,400 outpatient consultations and 1,150 surgical interventions
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