Karachi, Dec 20 (PTI): A polio vaccination team and their police escort were attacked on Friday by a mob during a vaccination drive in a densely populated area of Pakistan’s Karachi city.
Police reported the arrest of six individuals, including four women, in connection with the assault, which occurred in the Korangi area of the city, in a settlement predominantly inhabited by families from the country’s northern tribal areas.
“The polio team went to a house for administering the vaccine drops where the women present called two armed men and they attacked not only the health workers but also the policemen accompanying them,” said SSP Korangi, Kamran Khan.
Following the initial assault, the attackers called additional men from the settlement, who came armed with shovels and batons and escalated the attack on the health workers and police personnel.
Harassment and attacks against health workers carrying out polio vaccination drives for the government is fairly common in Pakistan.
On Tuesday, three security forces personnel were killed and two others injured in a blast targeting a vehicle carrying polio workers in the restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
A day earlier, a polio worker and a police constable were shot dead in separate incidents in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as the country began a week-long polio eradication campaign amid tight security.
Earlier this week, a female health worker was forcibly kept in confinement at an apartment building in Karachi’s Nazimabad after she went to an apartment to carry out her duties.
Pakistan is one of the last two countries in the world, alongside Afghanistan, where polio remains endemic, with the disease mostly affecting children under five and sometimes causing lifelong paralysis. Pakistan reported 64 cases of the crippling disease this year. One of the biggest challenges faced by health workers is the misinformation about the vaccine and security issues.
Despite global efforts to eradicate the virus, challenges such as security issues, vaccine hesitancy, and misinformation have slowed progress.
This year’s last polio vaccination drive in the country aimed to reach 10.6 million children under five. PTI GRS GRS GRS
(This story is published as part of the auto-generated syndicate wire feed. No editing has been done in the headline or the body by ABP Live.)
