{"id":1907,"date":"2005-10-27T08:51:59","date_gmt":"2005-10-27T15:51:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.amptoons.com\/blog\/archives\/2005\/10\/27\/the-lancet-study-of-iraqi-deaths\/"},"modified":"2005-10-27T08:51:59","modified_gmt":"2005-10-27T15:51:59","slug":"the-lancet-study-of-iraqi-deaths","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/?p=1907","title":{"rendered":"The Lancet Study of Iraqi Deaths"},"content":{"rendered":"

This topic has come up in P-A’s UNFPA thread: rather than derail that discussion further, I’ve put up a new post, and transfered comments about the Lancet <\/em>study from that post to this one.<\/p>\n

It’s been almost a year since the British medical journal The Lancet<\/em> published a study (pdf version here<\/a>) showing that deaths among ordinary Iraqis have increased <\/i>as a result of the American invasion and occupation.\n\n

This study is important because the invasion of Iraq, after the collapse of the WMD rationalization, is currently rationalized post hoc<\/em> as justified by the good our invasion has done the Iraqi people. While it’s certainly true that getting rid of Saddam is wonderful<\/a> – I mean that seriously – things on the other side of the scale – such as a massive increase in needless, violent deaths – need to be considered as well, if we’re going to take the “invade to help the people” argument seriously.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, neither the American media nor the pro-Iraq-invasion folks on either side of the partisan divide have seriously dealt with the Lancet study or its implications; instead, they’ve argued that the study is bad science. They’re wrong.<\/p>\n

From the abstract of the study:<\/p>\n

Background <\/strong><\/p>\n

In March, 2003, military forces, mainly from the USA and the UK, invaded Iraq. We did a survey to compare mortality during the period of 14.6 months before the invasion with the 17.8 months after it.<\/p>\n

Methods <\/strong><\/p>\n

A cluster sample survey was undertaken throughout Iraq during September, 2004. 33 clusters of 30 households each were interviewed about household composition, births, and deaths since January, 2002. In those households reporting deaths, the date, cause, and circumstances of violent deaths were recorded. We assessed the relative risk of death associated with the 2003 invasion and occupation by comparing mortality in the 17.8 months after the invasion with the 14.6-month period preceding it.<\/p>\n

Findings <\/strong><\/p>\n

The risk of death was estimated to be 2.5-fold (95% CI 1.6\u20134.2) higher after the invasion when compared with the preinvasion period. Two-thirds of all violent deaths were reported in one cluster in the city of Falluja. If we exclude the Falluja data, the risk of death is 1.5-fold (1.1\u20132.3) higher after the invasion. We estimate that 98 000 more deaths than expected (8000\u2013194 000) happened after the invasion outside of Falluja and far more if the outlier Falluja cluster is included. The major causes of death before the invasion were myocardial infarction, cerebrovascular accidents, and other chronic disorders whereas after the invasion violence was the primary cause of death. Violent deaths were widespread, reported in 15 of 33 clusters, and were mainly attributed to coalition forces. Most individuals reportedly killed by coalition forces were women and children. The risk of death from violence in the period after the invasion was 58 times higher (95% CI 8.1\u2013419) than in the period before the war.<\/p>\n

Interpretation <\/strong><\/p>\n

Making conservative assumptions, we think that about 100 000 excess deaths, or more have happened since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Violence accounted for most of the excess deaths and air strikes from coalition forces accounted for most violent deaths. We have shown that collection of public-health information is possible even during periods of extreme violence. Our results need further verification and should lead to changes to reduce noncombatant deaths from air strikes.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/pracut>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This topic has come up in P-A’s UNFPA thread: rather than derail that discussion further, I’ve put up a new post, and transfered comments about the Lancet study from that post to this one. It’s been almost a year since … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-iraq"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1907","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1907"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1907\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1907"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1907"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1907"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}