Islamists against Vaccines, but for Polio

These murders targeting polio vaccine workers and their security guards are a series of numerous attacks in recent years by the Pakistani Taliban who wrongly believe that the polio workers are a cover for espionage, along with other superstitious beliefs.  True, the CIA hired a local medical doctor in Abbottabad in order to find DNA evidence of Osama bin Laden and his family, and that has done tremendous damage to the efforts of vaccinators and health care in the region.  One has to wonder what the CIA planners were thinking, because they should have seen the big picture damage, not just to the health sector in Pakistan, but also to US-Pakistan relations in the longer term.

However, that was only new ammunition for Islamic extremists against vaccines.  They often view polio and other vaccines with suspicion, and that's true of extremists in other regions of the world too, not just in Pakistan.  Extremists in Afghanistan and Nigeria have also opposed vaccinations, and threaten vaccinators with violence.  And, true to their words, they often carry out their threats.

Consider a June 2009 report entitled “Religious Opposition to Polio Vaccination” by Haider Warraich of Aga Khan University Medical College in Karachi, in which he explains that:

“Religious opposition by Muslim fundamentalists is a major factor in the failure of immunization programs against polio in Nigeria, Pakistan and Afghanistan.  This religious conflict in the tribal areas of Pakistan is one of the biggest hindrances to effective polio vaccination. Epidemiologists have detected transmission of wild poliovirus from polio-endemic districts in Afghanistan, most of which are located in the southern region of this country bordering Pakistan, to tribal areas of Pakistan. This transmission has resulted in new cases of polio in previously polio-free districts. The local Taliban have issued fatwas denouncing vaccination as an American ploy to sterilize Muslim populations. Another common superstition spread by extremists is that vaccination is an attempt to avert the will of Allah. The Taliban have assassinated vaccination officials, including Abdul Ghani Marwat, who was the head of the government's vaccination campaign in Bajaur Agency in the Pakistani tribal areas, on his way back from meeting a religious cleric. Over the past year, several kidnappings and beatings of vaccinators have been reported. Vaccination campaigns in Nigeria and Afghanistan have also been hampered by Islamic extremists, especially in the Nigerian province of Kano in 2003, which has resulted in the infection returning to 8 previously polio-free countries in Africa.”

Osama bin Laden was killed in May 2011, and this report quoted above is from June 2009.  So, the Abbottabad CIA incident is just an excuse for the Pakistani Taliban.  In reality, Islamic extremists in various regions have opposed polio vaccinations years prior to Abbottabad.

Not only are many Muslim societies experiencing ideological social regression, but they are also forced into regression in the effort to eradicate diseases that should not exist at all in the 21st century.  Islamic extremists are literally allowing old era diseases like polio to flourish.  They should be called out for that.  They should be tried as the criminals they are when they kill, harass, and bully vaccinators.  They want to take the world back to the Stone Age, intellectually, emotionally, and physically.  They manifest themselves as ignorant thugs, and the greatest casualty will be young children and future generations.

The global madrassas and networks of clerics and religious establishments need to vocally condemn the ideologies and behavior of these extremists.  Health sectors need to interact with these religious institutions in order to promote a healthier attitude towards polio vaccinations and other health and medical priorities.  The religious institutions need to be receptive to these messages.   The cost of failure is too high.

Buddha once said, “Without health life is not life; it is only a state of langour and suffering - an image of death.”  The image of suffering and death is the shadow that these extremists cast over everyone.

Hayat Alvi, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor at the US Naval War College.

The views expressed are personal.