Kinship Inequalities Research Group, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research (MPIDR), Rostock, Germany.
Centre for Demographic Studies (CED), Barcelona, Spain.
Sci Adv. 2024 Jul 26;10(30):eado6951. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.ado6951.
Armed conflicts escalate combatant and civilian mortality and produce considerable levels of family bereavement. Yet, we know little about the prevalence of bereavement in conflict-affected populations. The violent loss of kin affects individuals across several dimensions, including trauma, mental health, socioeconomic status, and caregiving, especially during childhood and old age. Here, we propose a method to quantify population-level loss of parents and offspring in conflict-affected populations. Our analyses demonstrate that bereavement levels consistently surpass fatality rates in 16 conflict-affected settings. Using demographic projections, we show that these populations will continue to experience considerable levels of bereavement in the coming decades, independent of the future development of the respective conflicts. This quantification underscores bereavement as a profound yet understudied consequence of conflict with potentially far-reaching implications lingering long after the conflict's end.
武装冲突会导致战斗人员和平民的死亡率上升，并造成大量的家庭丧亲。然而，我们对受冲突影响人群中的丧亲率知之甚少。亲人的暴力死亡会影响到个人的多个方面，包括创伤、心理健康、社会经济地位和照顾，尤其是在儿童和老年时期。在这里，我们提出了一种量化受冲突影响人群中父母和子女群体丧失的方法。我们的分析表明，在 16 个受冲突影响的地区，丧亲率始终超过死亡率。通过人口统计预测，我们表明，在未来几十年中，这些人群将继续经历相当程度的丧亲之痛，而不论各自冲突的未来发展如何。这种量化突显了丧亲之痛是冲突的一个深远但研究不足的后果，其潜在影响在冲突结束很久之后仍会持续存在。
