Violence against vaccinators

Polio workers in Pakistan face severe threats, including sexual assault and murder, facing high security issues.

Polio workers in Pakistan have long had to deal with threats to their lives by radical anti-vaccination clerics and parents. Now, they even have to worry about sexual assaults. The incident in Jacobabad involved a polio worker being approached by somebody to come vaccinate some children. Instead, two male suspects kidnapped and raped her. And a thousand kilometres away, gunmen murdered a polio worker and a police official assigned to protect vaccinators.

In most war zones, militants and rebel groups have been known to show a degree of respect to health workers because, unlike the police and even administrative officials, it is hard to frame health workers as representing the 'oppressive state' against which they are fighting. But not so in Pakistan, where terrorists regularly attack vaccinators and other healthcare workers. Pakistan is a global basket case in terms of polio. Even the most war-torn, disaster-stricken countries have successfully eliminated the disease. The only other country where polio is endemic is Afghanistan, and the only new country or territory to pop up over the past several years is Palestine, whose healthcare system has been ravaged during Israel's genocidal assault. Prior to the Israeli bombing campaign, Palestine had been polio-free for several years.

While we may try to shift blame for new cases on the Afghans, the truth is that polio cases have occurred in areas where it is highly unlikely to be directly traceable to the porous border. To fix the problem, we must accept our own role in creating it. It is not just a security failure, but a societal failure that vaccinators need any protection. While the government certainly needs to take stern action against the direct perpetrators of such violence, it must also take to task those responsible for spreading disinformation about vaccination. Local communities also need to push back against those who spout anti-vaccine rhetoric if they really want to protect their children.