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Gunmen Kill Pakistani Polio-Eradication Worker, Injure Another

May 28, 2013

by RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal

PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- Pakistani officials say gunmen have shot dead a female polio-eradication worker on the outskirts of the northeastern city of Peshawar.

Police say a second member of the vaccination team was injured and taken to a nearby hospital.

The attack took place on the first day of a three-day vaccination campaign in the area.

No one has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Polio workers have increasingly come under deadly attack in Pakistan, where militants have suggested the vaccine harms children and accused health workers of spying for the United States.

"Motorcyclists opened fire on the polio [eradication] team, which resulted in the killing of one female polio worker and injuring another," Shahidullah, a police official at Badh Bher police station, told RFE/RL's Radio Mashaal on May 28. "The injured [polio worker] has been taken to a hospital."

In December, gunmen killed at least nine polio workers in separate attacks. Other attacks have killed or injured police officers assigned to protect polio-eradication campaigners.

Attacks have also targeted antipolio efforts in neighboring Afghanistan, which along with Pakistan and Nigeria represent the only three countries in the world that the World Health Organization (WHO) still regards as "polio-endemic." That figure is down from more than 125 countries in 1988.

Deadly attacks in Nigeria have been blamed on militants in the radical Islamic sect Boko Haram.

Polio affects mainly children under the age of 5.

The WHO warns that as long as any child is infected, the risk to other children remains significant. It estimates that a failure to eradicate polio from those remaining areas could balloon into 200,000 new cases a year within a decade.

With reporting by AFP

Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/polio-pakistan-killing-vaccination/24999412.html

Copyright (c) 2013. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.