Doctors Without Borders slams ‘deliberate’ Russian destruction of Ukraine’s health system

GENEVA – Doctors Without Borders (MSF) on July 13 condemned what it called Russia’s “deliberate strategy to destroy the healthcare system” in Ukraine, documenting a consistent pattern of attacks throughout the war.

Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of neighbouring Ukraine on Feb 24, 2022.

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 recorded 2,815 attacks on healthcare in Ukraine between the February 2022 Russian invasion and the end of 2025, with the vast majority involving violence with heavy weapons, and 2,319 attacks impacting on facilities.

The totality of the attacks resulted in 224 deaths and 902 injuries, said the WHO, 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 the city of Kherson falling by 66 per cent 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 Sept 29, 2025, a nurse and a director from an MSF-supported health centre were struck by a Russian FPV drone in Lyman, Donetsk, 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 (S$23 million).

It carried out 75,400 outpatient consultations and 1,150 surgical interventions. AFP