Medical Aid Should Not to Be Politicized

The medical aid agency Doctors Without Borders / Medicins sans frontiers (MSF), just published a strong call for governments not to politicize medical aid, particularly in war zones. Hell, yes! Please echo this and continue to rally around this point as the U.S. gets closer to foreign aid reform legislation due for debate and signing this Spring.

As I wrote last week in my post, Protect Mothers and Children, Without Weapons, there are many dangerous fall-outs from the U.S. strategy of civil-military operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and beyond. Although it might be very complicated to argue for the military not to be involved in aid at all, it is vital, absolutely vital that militaries clear a politically impartial space for medical and life-saving aid.

Perhaps the best means of winning the peace is for a national government -- even if it is backed by a foreign military -- to guarantee its citizens that it can be there to provide public services, job programs, and social inclusion.

There is a sharp exception, MSF points out, which aid agencies have protected well for decades before the dramatic changes in aid brought on by the global effort to prevent terrorism. During a war, citizens do not want to have to choose whether to save the lives of a family member through the services provided by one side if it means that they will be 'marked.'

For example, rumors abound in Afghanistan that health clinics operating in cooperation with U.S. military Provincial Reconstruction Teams, the pioneers of warrior aid, sometimes with armored humvees parked outside, may compile lists of patients because they are looking for enemy combatants and other intelligence.

Local families may choose not to bring their sick or injured member to the clinic for fear they will unwittingly lead NATO to a family member who is in the insurgency. Or they may choose not to go to the clinic for fear they will be seen by the insurgents as beholden to NATO. And these are just a few reasons.

Multiply these across the country and you have thousands, perhaps tens of thousands of people suffering a lack of health care or additional stress after receiving such care because of these politics. To many others beyond the sick, a NATO-tended clinic may sometimes symbolize a message to the community that, we will heal you, if you pledge loyalty.

You can rally around this issue here on Change.org. We're still looking for the most important U.S. senators and congresspeople to rally behind on this issue of aid reform, but please stay tuned and send us your recommendations. You can also rally around MSF on its Facebook page.

Photo credit: Daniel J Gerstle (A Somali sign warning not to bring weapons into a Health Ministry office)