Study: 100,000 Excess Civilian Iraqi Deaths Since War

LONDON (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of Iraqis have been killed in violence since the U.S.-led invasion last year, American public health experts have calculated in a report that estimates there were 100,000 "excess deaths" in 18 months.

The rise in the death rate was mainly due to violence and much of it was caused by U.S. air strikes on towns and cities.

"Making conservative assumptions, we think that about 100,000 excess deaths, or more have happened since the 2003 invasion of Iraq," said Les Roberts of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in a report published online by The Lancet medical journal.

"The use of air power in areas with lots of civilians appears to be killing a lot of women and children," Roberts told Reuters.

Mortality was already high in Iraq before the war because of United Nations sanctions blocking food and medical imports but the researchers described what they found as shocking.

The new figures are based on surveys done by the researchers in Iraq in September 2004. They compared Iraqi deaths during 14.6 months before the invasion in March 2003 and the 17.8 months after it by conducting household surveys in randomly selected neighborhoods.

Previous estimates based on think tank and media sources put the Iraqi civilian death toll at up to 16,053 and military fatalities as high as 6,370.

By comparison about 849 U.S. military were killed in combat or attacks and another 258 died in accidents or incidents not related to fighting, according to the Pentagon.

The researchers blamed air strikes for many of the deaths.

"What we have evidence of is the use of air power in populated urban areas and the bad consequences of it," Roberts said.

The researchers did 33 cluster surveys of 30 households each, recording the date, circumstances and cause of deaths.

They found that the risk of death from violence in the period after the invasion was 58 times higher than before the war.

Before the war the major causes of death were heart attacks, chronic disorders and accidents. That changed after the war.

Two-thirds of violent deaths in the study were reported in Falluja, the insurgent held city 50 km (32 miles) west of Baghdad which had been repeatedly hit by U.S. air strikes.

Source

It seems Americas precision munitions ain't as precise as advertised...

I'm not surprised about Fallujah.

Fallujah is just carnage, I don't see how they can carry out the kind of attacks they have on that city without inflicting heavy civilian deaths

That figure is almost unbelievable. :dry: Sorry 100,000? :blink:

If that figure was true then this war was and is truly a fuck-up more so than I thought....but again I don't believe it.

Fallujah is one big f*ck up, with 10,000's of deaths there alone :(

You should also remember that the 100,000 figure includes those Iraqi's killed by Insurgents and Terrorists, not just Coalition Forces.

That figure could also be on the high side, just like the "Official" figures are well under played...

The figure is an estimate.

However, there is no doubt about the 100,000's that died in the decade prior to the invasion, due to UK/US actions :(

I think that figure is probably accurate. The civilian death count is never reported, because "what would the world think?.

fallujah, alone has been under constant attack, as was Najaf, and Basra

I honestly don’t get it, what do these loonies achieve by killing them selves and innocent people in the process.

If they want to kill themselves why not do the old fashioned “bullet through the head”

Madness if you ask me

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Spam-King

I honestly don’t get it, what do these loonies achieve by killing them selves and innocent people in the process.

If they want to kill themselves why not do the old fashioned “bullet through the head”

Madness if you ask me

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which "loonies" are you talking about?

I was wondering that.

Is he saying that 100,000 Iraqi's have killed themselves, or 1000+ Americans :blink:

Quote:

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The rise in the death rate was mainly due to violence and much of it was caused by U.S. air strikes on towns and cities.

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and no one believed me back then :dry: (august 2003, well after the war had begun, i remember saying it many times that shock and awe would kill more civillians).

The Iraqi Body Count site which is generally considered one of the more accurate on this matter has a figure around 15,000 for deaths due directly to the War.

However, violent deaths is another matter - Iraq has became more or less lawless. Bodies float down the rivers with barely a second glance. Violent crime is rife. On top of this, every hospital was stripped bare and there was no power for months. Injuries and illness that should pose little concern have caused death. Consequently, a figure of 100,000 additional deaths may be realistic. It is unlikely we will ever really know. Of course, if large numbers have died then it might explain why the insugency is growing rather than shrinking.

In short, Iraq was not a good place to be under Saddam and it is still a horrible place to be. I think it is unlikely to become a hot tourist destination anytime soon.

Being Ex-British forces myself, I know how figures can get Smudged by the governments concerned, so i don't believe that any reported figures will ever be right.

Considering that even though the war is supposedly over, there are still civilians being killed daily in incidents caused by the occupation of Iraq.

Also: Eight more US marines killed in Fallujah and Ramadi, and 1 member of the Black Watch killed whilst re-locating. That now makes 1120 US troops KIA in Iraq, alongside 69 British soldiers (Source: http://icasualties.org/oif/ ), so if you put that in context, thats 84.10 civilians killed for each soldier that has lost their life due to this conflict.

I think that's quite believable.

My heart goes out to the families involved. Both military and civilian.