Summary Unknown gunmen riding on motorcycles attacked polio eradication team in Orangi Town No. 4.
KARACHI (Web Desk) – A policeman who was guarding a polio vaccination team in Karachi has been shot dead, Dunya News reported on Monday.
Unknown gunmen riding on motorcycles attacked polio eradication team in Orangi Town No. 4 area of the metropolis, killing policeman Tabbasum however none of the health team were harmed.
Meanwhile, the vaccination campaign was stopped in District West. Anti-polio drive is being carried out in three districts including Malir, West and East districts during which a target of inoculating 876,290 children below age of five has been set.
In District East, polio drops will be administered to 231,963 children in 23 union councils, 419,505 children in 30 union councils of District West and 224,822 children in 19 UCs of Malir District.
Pakistan is one of only three countries where polio remains endemic and attempts to stamp it out have been badly hit by opposition from armed groups and attacks on immunisation teams, which have claimed more than 60 lives in the last two years.
Armed groups have in the past claimed that the polio vaccination is a cover for espionage or a Western conspiracy to sterilise Muslims.
Officials say the number of polio cases recorded in Pakistan has reached 246 in 2014 - a 14-year high and more than double the total for the whole of 2013.
