2018 Essays

Biafra at 50 and the Birth of Emergency Public Health

Phillips, James F.

Five decades ago, the Nigerian civil war claimed as many as 2 million lives over the May 1967 to January 1970 period . This brief commentary provides the perspective of a front-line worker in the Nigeria-Biafra relief effort on strategies that were intended to save lives during the conflict. While no one knows precisely how many people may have died, there was little doubt at the time that the Nigerian civil war was the most catastrophic conflict ever to have occurred in Africa.