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Suicide Bombing Terrorism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 October 2021

Derrick Tin Open the ORCID record for Derrick Tin [Opens in a new window] ,
Jordan Galehan ,
Vesna Markovic  and
Gregory R. Ciottone
Derrick Tin*
Affiliation:
Senior Fellow, BIDMC Disaster Medicine Fellowship; Department of Emergency Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, Cambridge, MassachusettsUSA
Jordan Galehan
Affiliation:
Assistant Professor of Criminology, Department of Behavioral Sciences, Flagler College, Saint Augustine, FloridaUSA
Vesna Markovic
Affiliation:
Professor and Chair, Justice, Law and Public Safety Studies, Lewis University, Romeoville, IllinoisUSA
Gregory R. Ciottone
Affiliation:
Director, BIDMC Disaster Medicine Fellowship; Department of Emergency Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center; Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MassachusettsUSA
*
Correspondence: Derrick Tin, MBBS Senior Fellow, BIDMC Disaster Medicine Fellowship Department of Emergency Medicine Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School Cambridge, MassachusettsUSA E-mail: dtin@bidmc.harvard.edu
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Abstract

Introduction:

While suicide bombings in the context of warfare have existed throughout history, there was an exponential rise in such attacks in the decade following the initiation of the War on Terror. The health care implications of such attacks are a growing concern across the emergency response sector, and this study is an epidemiological examination of all terrorism-related bombings sustained from 1970-2019, comparing the rates of fatal injuries (FI) and non-fatal injuries (NFI) between suicide bombing attacks (SBA) versus non-suicide bombing attacks (NSBA).

Method:

Data collection was performed using a retrospective database search through the Global Terrorism Database (GTD). The GTD database was downloaded and searched using the internal database search functions for all events that occurred from January 1, 1970 - December 31, 2019. Bombing/explosion as a primary “attack type” and explosives as a primary “weapon type” were selected for the purpose of this study, and events were further sub-classified as either “suicide attack” or “non-suicide attack.” Results were exported into an Excel spreadsheet (Microsoft Corp.; Redmond, Washington USA) for analysis.

Findings:

There were 82,217 bombing/explosion terrorist attacks using explosives documented during the study period with 135,807 fatalities and 352,500 NFI.

A total of 5,416 events (6.59% of all events) were sub-classified as SBA causing 52,317 FI (38.52% of all FI) and 107,062 NFI (30.37% of all NFI).

Mean SBA FI was 9.66 per event and mean SBA NFI was 19.77 per event compared to a mean NSBA FI of 1.09 per event and mean NSBA NFI of 3.20 per event.

Conclusion:

Suicide bombing attacks are a unique terrorist methodology that can inflict wide-spread psychological damage as well as significantly higher death and injury tolls when compared to more traditional NSBA. They have been increasing in popularity amongst terrorist organizations and groups, and Counter-Terrorism Medicine (CTM) specialists need to be aware of the unique injury patterns and potential risk mitigation strategies associated with SBA depending on the target type, location, and gender of the perpetrator.

Keywords

counter-terrorism medicinedisaster medicinesuicide bombingterrorism
Type
Original Research
Information
Prehospital and Disaster Medicine , Volume 36 , Issue 6 , December 2021 , pp. 664 - 668
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Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the World Association for Disaster and Emergency Medicine

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