Daily beast: Pakistan: Mullahs and Militants Keep Polio Alive
Unidentified assailants have killed two more immunization workers in northwestern Pakistan’s Chardassa district, outside Peshawar, bringing the total number to eight. In response, the organizers of the three-day polio vaccination drive suspended the campaign nationwide. No armed group has claimed responsibility.
Six health workers in Pakistan are the latest to be killed for trying to eradicate a crippling illness. Sami Yousafzai talks to the immunizers and their foes.
- The physician from the Pakistani Health Ministry acknowledges that he expected some of the country’s rural areas to be risky. Still, he had no idea how dangerous the cities would be. This week began with six polio-vaccination workers—five women and a man—being shot dead in four separate attacks in Karachi and Peshawar. On Wednesday a seventh polio worker was shot and seriously injured in Peshawar. “We were worried in the countryside and tribal areas,” says Dr. Jamshid, who for the sake of his own safety declines to use his full name. “This means even in the cities we will have trouble.”
The nationwide eradication drive, which had been in the second of three scheduled days, was quickly suspended in Karachi. “Police were on alert,” says Shahnaz Wazir Ali, the Pakistani prime minister’s chief adviser for the immunization effort, “but the polio teams are in the thousands. It would not be possible to keep police with each team. Tomorrow was to be the last day of the campaign, but we have suspended it in Karachi for the moment to protect our staff’s lives. We must secure the health of the future.”
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