International Community Unprepared for Staving Off Effects of Iraq War

A new report on the humanitarian consequences of an Iraq war issued by the Center for Economic and Social Rights (CESR) claims that a "US-led military intervention in Iraq will trigger the collapse of Iraq's public health and food distribution system, leading to a humanitarian crisis that far exceeds the capacity of the United Nations and relief agencies."

Echoing the UN's own predictions, Michael Van Rooyen, Director of the Center for International Emergency, Disaster and Refugee Studies at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, says that the CESR report "confirms that international relief agencies are unlikely to avert a major humanitarian disaster in the event of war."