Karachi polio killings: Vaccination workers shot
BBC News online - 18 December 2012
There were scenes of mourning in Karachi
Five
female Pakistani polio vaccination workers have been fatally shot in a
string of co-ordinated attacks - four within 20 minutes across Karachi.
A UN-backed programme to eradicate polio - which is endemic in Pakistan - has been suspended in Karachi.
No group has said it carried out the shootings, but the Taliban have issued threats against the polio drive.
"These were pre-planned and co-ordinated attacks in various localities which took place within a span of 20 minutes," Imran Javed, a police spokesman told the BBC of Tuesday's attacks in Karachi.
Earlier reports said a male health worker had been shot dead in Karachi on Monday, but officials now say his death was not related to the polio vaccination drive.
Pakistani health officials said the latest three-day nationwide anti-polio drive - during which an estimated 5.2 million polio drops were to be administered - had been suspended in Karachi, Pakistan's largest city with a population of 18 million.
There has been opposition to such
immunisation drives in parts of Pakistan, particularly after a fake CIA
hepatitis vaccination campaign helped to locate Osama Bin Laden in
2011.
However, the Pakistani government "would continue to mount its effort on polio eradication," Mr Ashraf's special adviser Shahnaz Wazir Ali told the BBC.
Mrs Ali said protection would be provided to workers, and campaigns would be staggered if necessary.
Along with Afghanistan and Nigeria, Pakistan is one of only three countries where polio is still endemic.
Pakistan is considered the key battleground in the global fight against the disease, which attacks the nervous system and can cause permanent paralysis within hours of infection.
Polio facts
- Highly infectious viral disease
- Transmitted via contaminated faeces
- Can cause irreversible paralysis, usually in the legs
- A minority of cases are fatal
Almost 200 children were paralysed in the country in 2011 - the worst figures in 15 years.
Earlier this year, the Global Polio Eradication Initiative
warned that tackling the disease had entered "emergency mode" after
"explosive" outbreaks in countries previously free of polio.The World Health Organization (WHO) said polio was at a tipping point, with experts fearing it could "come back with a vengeance" after large outbreaks in Africa and Tajikistan and China's first recorded cases for more than a decade.
Declaring polio a national emergency, the Pakistani government is targeting 33 million children for vaccination with some 88,000 health workers delivering vaccination drops.
Dr Bruce Aylward of the WHO told the BBC that vaccination programmes had been suspended in other countries before but that "when you're dealing with something as basic as the health of children, usually there can be common ground found".
Dr Aylward said he hoped for a "dialogue with community leaders who have positions of power to ensure root causes of this are being addressed and the perpetrators are brought to justice".
Poliomyelitis has existed as long as
human society, but became a major public health issue in late Victorian
times with major epidemics in Europe and the United States. The disease,
which causes spinal and respiratory paralysis, can kill and remains
incurable but vaccines have assisted in its almost total eradication
today.
Labels: Disease, Education, Health, Pakistan
posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, December 18, 2012
<< Home