PESHAWAR – Militants attacked a health center used in an ongoing anti-polio campaign in northwestern Pakistan on Tuesday, triggering a shootout that left a police officer dead, local authorities said. Three of the attackers were also killed in the exchange.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack in Orakzai, a district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and a former stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban.
Local police officer Adnan Khan said the attack happened in the morning hours as health workers were gathering ahead of leaving for the door-to-door campaign along with police, who escort polio teams for their safety.
No polio worker was harmed in Tuesday’s attack but another police officer was wounded, Khan added.
Also Tuesday, militants stormed a health center in North Waziristan, another former stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, snatched guns from officers and warned health workers who had gathered there not to take part in the anti-polio campaign, local police officer Shoib Khan said.
The attackers then left with the weapons they seized, he said, without offering more details.
Militants in Pakistan often target police and polio workers during campaigns against polio, claiming the vaccination drives are a Western conspiracy to sterilize children.
Pakistan and Afghanistan are the only two countries in the world where the spread of polio has never been stopped. In severe cases, polio can cause permanent paralysis and death.
Pakistan on Monday launched another nationwide polio drive to vaccinate 45 million children under age 5 after a surge in new cases. The campaign is the third this year.
Pakistan has recorded 41 cases across 71 districts so far this year, mostly in southwestern Balochistan and southern Sindh provinces, as well as in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and eastern Punjab province.
In Afghanistan, local health authorities said Monday that vaccinations have also started in 16 of the country’s 34 provinces. The campaign will last three days and target 6.2 million children under the age of 5, according to spokesman Sharafat Zaman.
World Health Organization data says there have been 23 confirmed cases in Afghanistan this year.
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