Armed Conflict and Public Health: Understanding the Global Impact

Armed conflict (war) has profound and extensive impacts on public health. It causes morbidity and mortality directly, mainly from explosive weapons, and indirectly, due to destruction of health-supporting infrastructure and forced displacement of populations. Armed conflict damages the environment and the preparations for war divert human and financial resources away from health care, public health, education and other social services to support the community.

Public health professionals play important roles in documenting the health consequences of war, raising awareness of these consequences and advocating for the prevention of war and the promotion of peace.

This webinar will explore how war fundamentally reshapes the health and well-being of communities and hinders the systems designed to protect them. It will provide an overview of how war adversely affects the health of populations, from both a public health perspective and a humanitarian perspective, and what public health professionals can do to help prevent war and its adverse health consequences.

Participants will gain a foundational understanding of why armed conflict must be viewed as a complex public health emergency, and how the field can lead efforts in response, recovery and prevention.