Clerics issue fatwas to end vaccine panic
Leading Muslim clerics have issued fatwas supporting Pakistan’s polio vaccination programme in an effort to end Islamist violence against medical staff and dispel panic that the shots can be fatal.
The Council of Islamic Ideology, which advises politicians on whether laws are compliant with Islam, has declared the polio vaccine to be safe.
Videos on social media claiming the vaccine was fatal to children fuelled a series of riots in which a health clinic in Peshawar was set on fire.
Thousands of families have refused treatment and confirmed cases reached the highest since 2014.
Islamist militants have murdered four medical workers in the belief that polio teams are Western spies or part of a plot to sterilise the population.
As a result the government turned to the Islamic council for help and clerics issued fatwas throughout the country. One states: ‘‘Doctors’ research suggests that these drops and vaccines are useful for the prevention of harmful diseases and this polio vaccine is not dangerous.’’
Babar Bin Atta, head of the polio drive, said the council’s intervention was vital to combat disinformation. ‘‘People think that polio eradication is a Western programme. We have to teach them there is nothing un-Islamic about it,’’ he said.
Pakistan is one of three countries where polio is prevalent, along with Afghanistan and Nigeria. More than 40 million children have been vaccinated this year, but the virus has been found in sewage samples from several cities. Missteps by the West have also fuelled conspiracy theories. The CIA used a fake vaccination programme to help to hunt down Osama bin Laden in Pakistan. The next year more than a million more people refused treatment.