Gunmen attack anti-polio team in Pakistan; injures one worker

Gunmen have attacked a polio vaccination team in northwest Pakistan bordering Afghanistan, injuring a worker, police officials said on Saturday --- the latest attack on vaccination teams in recent years by militants in the restive region. Unidentified assailants opened fire at a polio vaccination team in Mir Ali tehsil in North Waziristan tribal district on Saturday, which left a worker named Sher Ali injured, police said.

Gunmen have attacked a polio vaccination team in northwest Pakistan bordering Afghanistan, injuring a worker, police officials said on Saturday --- the latest attack on vaccination teams in recent years by militants in the restive region. Unidentified assailants opened fire at a polio vaccination team in Mir Ali tehsil in North Waziristan tribal district on Saturday, which left a worker named Sher Ali injured, police said. Ali was immediately admitted to a local hospital, where he is undergoing treatment, they said. On Tuesday, three people, including two policemen, escorting an anti-polio vaccination team, were killed when unidentified assailants attacked them in north Waziristan tribal district. In March this year, gunmen in northwestern Pakistan shot and killed a female polio worker as she was returning home after taking part in the country's latest anti-polio campaign.

In January last year, armed gunmen shot dead a police officer guarding a team of polio vaccine handlers in northwestern Pakistan. Polio is a highly infectious disease caused by a virus which mainly affects children under the age of five. It invades the nervous system and can cause paralysis or even death.

While there is no cure for polio, vaccination is the only effective way to protect children from the crippling disease. Pakistan, along with Afghanistan are the last polio-endemic countries in the world, according to the World Health Organisation.

Recently, Pakistan's vaccination programme has come under scrutiny after the detection of poliovirus in sewage samples in London for the first time in four decades. In May this year, the Pakistan government launched a nationwide anti-polio drive to vaccinate more than 43 million children after cases of the virus surfaced in the country. Several Pakistan governments in the past had to suspend the anti-polio drive following a growing number of attacks on polio workers in different parts of the country. Attempts to eradicate the crippling disease have been seriously hampered by deadly targeting of vaccination teams in recent years by militants, who oppose the drives, claiming that the polio drops cause infertility.