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The Trump administration is stressing that America is out of the nation-building enterprise as it crafts its policy toward the Middle East. However, as the Islamic State is territorially defeated within Iraq, the future stability of the country rests on how effectively the Iraqi governmentwith U.S. and international assistancecan reconstruct and reintegrate the previously alienated Sunni population. Many areas will require concentrated focus, including security, governance, economic stabilization and infrastructure. Unfortunately, there is one overlooked issue that will determine the long-term security of the country: the status of its public-health system. If Iraq fails to address health security in the areas liberated from the Islamic State, then the country may once again plunge into chaos, making all of the military gains in vain.

Need to Address Public-Health System

Rebuilding the public-health and health-care-delivery systems must not be dismissed as a secondary focus as conditions in former Islamic Stateheld territories, and much of the Middle East indicate an incipient vulnerability to an epidemic. The entire region is plagued by preventable diseases, displaced persons and low-state expenditures on health care. An Ebola-esque outbreak spreading across the Middle East is not unrealistic.

An epidemic would stress Iraq to the breaking point; anything short of an immediate coordinated response by the Iraqi government under the current environment of sectarianism would reignite feelings of alienation and neglect. If the Iraqi government is unwillingor unableto provide the needed services, other groups will step in to fill that void. Terrorist organizations and non-state actors alike have utilized the provision of social services, including health care, to bolster their own legitimacy amongst the populace.

Risk of Epidemic

Mosul is in ruin. The citys infrastructure has been destroyed by conflict-and-maintenance neglect alike under the Islamic State. Hospitals and schools are destroyed, houses are riddled with improvised explosive devices, the inhabitants are starving, vulnerable and displaced. Though the Islamic State claimed to provide Muslims with extensive healthcare by running a host of medical facilities including hospitals and clinics in all major cities, the health situation under the Islamic State was nonexistent for most inhabitants. Prevented from appropriate access to health care, children are undernourished, anemic and lack necessary vaccines. Chronic conditions plague adults who havent had access to treatment for years. The Iraqi Government, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, World Health Organization and other international organizations are providing health services to these liberated Iraqisbut these are only short-term fixes as health infrastructure must be rebuilt to inculcate long-term health security.

Iraqs endemic-cholera problem showcases the inability of its health infrastructure to mitigate the risk of an easily preventable disease. The most recent outbreak in 2015 was fueled by many of the same causes of concerns that still exist, particularly the large numbers of internally displaced persons and refugees living under unsanitary conditions. Though the Iraqi Ministry of Healthalong with the United Nations Childrens Emergency Fund and World Health Organizationwas able to stop the outbreak through an oral-vaccination campaign, it failed to address the precursors that lead to the outbreak in the first place.

Iraq finds itself wedged up against a failed state in Syria, which has seen its health-care system depleted over the course of an intractable civil war. More importantly, the targeting of health personnel and services in Syrian cities by a myriad of actors has left essential welfare services nonexistent. With no end in sight, Syrian instability will cross the border into Iraq in the form of refugees, terrorists and diseases. Iraq does not have the infrastructure to prevent an epidemic though it may be able to contain one with international assistance. Yet the areas most destroyed and susceptible to an outbreak are the areas that were alienated by the central government prior to the rise of the Islamic State. If an outbreak does occur, these feelings of alienation will resurface.

Current Reconstruction

Facing a variety of looming issues, the Iraqi central government has limited support for reforming the countrys public-health system. Additionally, as a long-term project, political infighting will derail efforts along the way. With the immense cost of the Islamic State campaign and the plunge of global oil prices in 2014, the Iraqi government cannot foot the bill for the billions of dollars it will cost to rebuild Mosul, leaving it to the international community, which historically has suffered from donor fatigue following a conflict.

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Keeping ISIS On the Retreat in Iraq Will Depend on Health Care - The National Interest Online