From 18 April to 1 May 2018, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), supported by the European Commission’s European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations in collaboration with the Belgian Red Cross, will broadcast a short film on the risks to health-care in cinemas across Belgium. The video projection is part of the ‘Health-Care in Danger’ campaign which raises awareness on the all too often existent dangers of providing health-care outside the EU.  The campaign was originally rolled out in Spain and Germany in 2017 and is now also being deployed in Belgian cinemas.

With this short film #NotATarget the ICRC and the European Union address the widespread and severe impact of illegal and often violent acts that obstruct the delivery of health care, damage or destroy facilities and vehicles, and injure or kill health-care workers and patients. Based on humanitarian field experience and different studies done on the subject, the ICRC and the EU believe that lack of safe access to health care in conflict or other emergencies is affecting millions of people. Yet, the significance of this issue is not fully grasped. For the ICRC health care includes hospitals, clinics, first-aid posts, and ambulances.

For this video the allegory of a football game was used to illustrate that, like in popular sports, even wars have rules and limits. A single act of violence that damages a hospital or kills health-care workers has a knock-on effect, depriving many patients of treatment they would otherwise have received from the facility or workers in question.

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Press Release

European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO)