I know that the US lost about 150 soldiers and Iraq lost about 30.000. However, I often heard that hundreds of thousands of iraqi children died as a result of the embargo following the war. It seems like an extremely high figure and I was wondering what the straight dope was on this.
Reports vary from relatively low
http://www.casi.org.uk/discuss/2000/msg00003.html
to very high
http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/2003/01/000222.html
and probably more to come…:mad:
We’ve covered this. A lot.
All estimates vary. For what it’s worth, ICRC (AKA, Red Cross)'s reports from 2001 say that most of the problem was the Iraqi government’s failure to provide health services and clean water. It was not helped by the embargo, which amoung other things prevents the import of chlorine for water purification, but the ICRC themselves have been involved in building these facilities.
For a more realistic look at the effect of the medical embargo, look at Cuba, a country that actually tries to put forth a health program, and is generally successful, barring supply shortages.
Lemme look up my ICRC source… if SDMB ever wants to load the search page…
Whenever you see those “facts” about huge numbers of children dying, first check them against the population figures. I’ve seen several figures that indicated Saddam must have perfected cloning and that Iraq now must have had an average lifespan of 200+ years for anyone who survived to age 18. 
One too few?
This topic has been discussed recently, so I’ll close this thread and direct further comment to the earlier one: Some Numbers - Iraq. Sanctions, and War
bibliophage
moderator GQ