PORT SUDAN, SUDAN: In war-torn Sudan, even hospitals are no longer safe. In one of the most chilling reminders of how deeply conflict is dismantling health systems, Al Jabalayn Teaching Hospital in White Nile State was attacked while a Cesarean section was underway, killing 10 health workers — including the hospital’s medical director — and injuring 22 others. The emergency room and operating theatre were completely destroyed, turning what should have been a place of survival into another front line of war.
For millions already trapped in Sudan’s humanitarian nightmare, this is not an isolated tragedy. It is part of an accelerating pattern that the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) say is pushing health care access toward collapse. In the nearly three years since conflict erupted in 2023, WHO has verified 214 attacks on health care, causing 2,042 deaths and 785 injuries. In the first quarter of 2026 alone, 13 attacks have already been confirmed, leaving 184 dead and 295 injured.
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The timing of the Al Jabalayn strike has horrified global health observers. According to the joint WHO-UNICEF statement, the attack occurred during one of the hospital’s busiest hours, while a Cesarean delivery was in progress. This detail underscores a brutal reality: the most vulnerable patients — mothers, newborns, children, and trauma victims — are now among those most exposed to the violence.
This latest assault follows earlier attacks on Kurmuk Teaching Hospital in Blue Nile State, a medical supplies warehouse in Rabak, and Al Daein Al Usra Hospital, where health workers were reportedly assaulted. The repeated targeting of medical infrastructure is rapidly eroding what remains of Sudan’s fragile emergency care network.
Dr Shible Sahbani, WHO Representative to Sudan, issued one of the strongest condemnations yet, saying the continued attacks are restricting care “at a time when it is needed most.”
He warned that patients and health workers should never have to risk death while seeking or providing treatment, and called on all parties in the conflict to respect International Humanitarian Law and the sanctity of health services.
That warning carries even greater urgency as Sudan’s health system remains deeply fractured by displacement, disease outbreaks, shortages of medicines, and repeated infrastructure losses. WHO estimates that more than a third of health facilities across the country remain non-functional.
For children, the consequences are even more devastating.
Sheldon Yett, UNICEF Representative to Sudan, called attacks on hospitals a grave violation of children’s rights, warning that every destroyed facility strips children of the care and protection they need in their most vulnerable moments.
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This is especially alarming in a country where millions of children are already facing hunger, displacement, interrupted immunization, and disease outbreaks. When maternity wards, surgical theatres, and emergency rooms are destroyed, the fallout extends far beyond immediate casualties — it threatens survival pathways for an entire generation.
The crisis in Sudan is becoming a defining global health emergency. Attacks on hospitals do not just kill doctors and patients in the moment — they trigger a cascading collapse in trauma care, maternal health, childhood immunization, surgery, disease surveillance, and outbreak response.
For the global medical community, Sudan is now a stark case study in what happens when health systems become battlefields.
WHO and UNICEF have renewed their call for all sides to protect hospitals, safeguard humanitarian workers, and guarantee uninterrupted access to lifesaving services for children and families.
The message from Port Sudan is devastatingly simple: when hospitals are attacked, entire futures are buried under the rubble.
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