On the frontline of eastern Burma's chronic conflict--listening to the voices of local health workers.

Globally, attacks on and interferences with health workers and healthcare delivery, including targeted violence towards providers, attacks on hospitals and delays and denial of health care, represent a serious humanitarian and human rights issue. However, gaps in research about these events persist, limiting the evidence base from which to understand and address the problem. This paper focuses on experiences of local health workers in eastern Burma's chronic conflict, including their strategies for addressing security and ensuring access to vulnerable ethnic communities in the region. Face-to-face in-depth interviews were conducted in June and August 2012 with 27 health workers from three health organizations that operate throughout eastern Burma, with their operational head quarters located in Mae Sot, Tak Province, Thailand. Qualitative analysis found that health workers in this setting experience violent and non-violent interferences with their work, and that the Burmese government's military activities in the region have severely impacted access to care, which remains restricted. Data show that innovative security strategies have emerged, including the important role of the community in ensuring securer access to health care. This study underscores health workers' concern for improved data collection to support the rights of health workers to provide health care, and the rights of community members to receive health care in conflict-affected settings. Findings will inform the development of an incident reporting form to improve systematic data collection and documentation of attacks on health in this setting.

Footer KH ，Meyer S ，Sherman SG ，Rubenstein L ... -  《-》

Measurement of attacks and interferences with health care in conflict: validation of an incident reporting tool for attacks on and interferences with health care in eastern Burma.

Haar RJ ，Footer KH ，Singh S ，Sherman SG ，Branchini C ，Sclar J ，Clouse E ，Rubenstein LS ... -  《Conflict and Health》

Human resources for health: task shifting to promote basic health service delivery among internally displaced people in ethnic health program service areas in eastern Burma/Myanmar.

Low S ，Tun KT ，Mhote NP ，Htoo SN ，Maung C ，Kyaw SW ，Shwe Oo SE ，Pocock NS ... -  《Global Health Action》

Conflict, health care and professional perseverance: a qualitative study in the West Bank.

Sousa C ，Hagopian A 《-》

Providing care under extreme adversity: The impact of the Yemen conflict on the personal and professional lives of health workers.

The war in Yemen, described as the world's 'worst humanitarian crisis,' has seen numerous attacks against health care. While global attention to attacks on health workers has increased significantly over the past decade, gaps in research on the lived experiences of frontline staff persist. This study draws on perspectives of frontline health workers in Yemen to understand the impact of the ongoing conflict on their personal and professional lives. Forty-three facility-based health worker interviews, and 6 focus group discussions with community-based health workers and midwives were conducted in Sana'a, Aden and Taiz governorates at the peak of the Yemen conflict. Data were analysed using content analysis methods. Findings highlight the extent and range of violence confronting health workers in Yemen as well as the coping strategies they use to attenuate the impact of acute and chronic stressors resulting from conflict. We find that the complex security situation - characterized by multiple parties to the conflict, politicization of humanitarian aid and constraints in humanitarian access - was coupled with everyday stressors that prevented health workers from carrying out their work. Participants reported sporadic attacks by armed civilians, tensions with patients, and harassment at checkpoints. Working conditions were dire, and participants reported chronic suspension of salaries as well as serious shortages of essential supplies and medicines. Themes specific to coping centered around fatalism and religious motivation, resourcefulness and innovation, and sense of duty and patriotism. Our findings demonstrate that health workers experience substantial stress and face various pressures while delivering lifesaving services in Yemen. While they exhibit considerable resilience and coping, they have needs that remain largely unaddressed. Accordingly, the humanitarian community should direct more attention to responding to the mental health and psychosocial needs of health workers, while actively working to ameliorate the conditions in which they work.

Elnakib S ，Elaraby S ，Othman F ，BaSaleem H ，Abdulghani AlShawafi NA ，Saleh Al-Gawfi IA ，Shafique F ，Al-Kubati E ，Rafique N ，Tappis H ... -  《-》