Polio Killings: Dr. Ahmed Datti Started It

IYOBOSA UWUGIAREN  Writes

A renowned doctor and leader of the Supreme Council for Sharia in Nigeria, Dr. Ahmed Datti, started it all in 2003 when he mounted a dangerous campaign that the polio vaccine had been “corrupted and tainted by evildoers from America and their Western allies”. He did not only stop there, he took his wicked campaign to many mosques in the northern parts of the country, telling his huge followers not to have anything to do with polio vaccination. On Friday, last week, Dr. Datti’s campaign claimed nine innocent lives when some gunmen riding on a motor tricycle opened fire in the Hotoro Hayi neighbourhood, killing at least five female health workers, polio vaccinators. Another four people were killed in a second attack in the Unguwa-Uku area. I was told Unguwa-Uku in Kano is a home of Boko Haram, the Islamic fundamentalists that have been terrorising the northern part of the country.

The slaughtering of these nine innocent female health workers who were carrying out health services for children against polio is devilish before man and Almighty God. As UNICEF and the World Health Organization (WHO) put it, such attacks are a double tragedy for the health workers and their families and for the children and vulnerable populations who are robbed of basic life-saving health interventions. As has been expressed globally, these attacks are intolerable and condemnable under any condition. Sadly for our country, these brutal killings have also drawn relationship with a series of incidents in troubled countries like Pakistan and Afghanistan where female polio vaccinators have also been killed by Islamist militants. The impression being planted in the minds of civilized nations is that we share common evil things with Pakistan and a crisis-ridden country like Afghanistan. We are fast being dragged to the perilous club of terrorists who fight religious war.

What’s more? We are sending signals of a new wave of violent attacks against immunisation scheme in our country by acts of some devil incarnates parading themselves as Islamic clerics who have consistently claimed that the polio vaccines were part of a western plot to sterilise little girls in the north and reduce the Muslim population. Too bad! The promoters of this ungodly act should hold their heads in shame. I am sure the hottest place will be reserved for them in hellfire.

While this campaign against polio vaccination is being promoted in the northern part of the country by renowned medical experts like Dr. Datti and, lately, one Professor Kaita of Ahmed Bello University, Zaria, our country remains one of the most deep-rooted reservoirs of wild polio virus in the world. According to the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, Nigeria is the only country with ongoing transmission of all three serotypes: Wild Poliovirus Type 1, Wild Poliovirus Type 3, and Circulating Vaccine-derived Poliovirus Type 2. Records have also shown that states in the north of the country are the main source of polio infections elsewhere in Nigeria and in neighbouring countries. Even though there have been improvement in the operation in the northern states, which has led to a decline in cases of Wild Poliovirus type 1 and, in overall cases, this current attempt by those opposed to it to copy tactics being used by militants in Pakistan and Afghanistan, who had accused health workers of spying for the US, will not help the current huge efforts by the federal government to fight this virus that is crippling children in the north.

It is very painful when one remembers that one of the promoters of “No to Polio Vaccination”, Dr. Datti, is one of the first-class doctors from the northern part of the country. He ought to know that the global polio eradication initiative was formed in 1988 by well-meaning people who care for children, with the sole aim of reducing infection with poliomyelitis virus; and, several years later, thousands of children have contracted acute flaccid paralysis caused by poliovirus infection. This finding represented a huge increase over the number of cases and resulted in the re-emergence of polio as one of the world’s deadliest infections. In 2009, polio was found endemic to four countries: India, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Afghanistan and, in 2008, cases were also detected in 14 other countries. And there is no reason whatsoever why religion opposition by Muslim fundamentalists should be a major factor in the failure of immunisation programmes against polio in Nigeria. O yes! There is no reason at all. We have been repeatedly told that Islam is a progressive religion, and therefore religious leaders should be asked to support polio eradication programmes. All the Imams and other Islamic leaders must make efforts to stop this mess created by Dr. Datti and step up the campaign for polio vaccination in order to highlight the plight of children with polio.

As the inspector-general of police had ordered, vaccinators and other health workers operating in conflict zones should be provided protection so that they are better able to perform their duties to the needy children. The recent ugly incident that happened in Kano should not discourage the vaccinators. The evil men that carried out the disaster must be defeated. The only way to defeat them is not to succumb to their ungodly acts. The overall purpose is to make the children in those areas safer and make sure the virus is not exported to areas where wild polio transmission has been interrupted by vaccination. The like of Dr. Datti should spearhead the campaign this time round. Along with that, the federal government should continue with the interruption of endemic transmission of poliovirus, which has been pursued through a combination of routine immunisation, supplementary immunisation campaigns and surveillance of possible outbreaks. The federal government should also make available more basic health infrastructure that will increase vaccine distribution and delivery.

In all this, the efforts of the Sultan of Sokoto in the war against polio must be commended. Like a true soldier, he has been soldiering across the northern states of the country telling his subjects that , unlike the evil message of Dr. Datti, polio vaccination was not a Western plot to sterilise little girls in the north and reduce the Muslim population. That is what a true, honest and sincere leader should do in times of crisis and doubt. His Eminence the Sultan of Sokoto has proved his exemplary leadership qualities. Na gode, Maigida.