KARACHI: It was a nightmare at noon for over 30 female vaccinators who were to inoculate children with booster drops against polio in a Gadap town locality when they were forced to run for their lives after a sudden attack by six armed men, officials said.

The vaccinators took shelter in a nearby school as policemen guarding them returned fire and managed to catch one of the attackers, they said.

The anti-polio drive - started across the province last - weekend often runs into snags in Gadap area where most violent attacks on polio teams have been reported.

Officials said some 20 polio teams, comprising over 30 women vaccinators along with a few male volunteers, had to stay idle for two days because of lack of police security.

After finally getting police security on Wednesday, they gathered to cover children in the areas falling in the jurisdiction of Gulshan-i-Maimar police station.

“The teams gathered at a meeting point near Noor Mohammad Brohi Goth after covering some neighbourhoods when six armed men on three motorcycles appeared at the corner of the street and opened fire on our teams,” said Dr Shakoor Abbasi, town health officer of Gadap, while speaking to Dawn.

He said the attack shocked the teams, women in particular, who ran for their lives and took shelter in a nearby school. “A young woman fell while running on the potholed street and bruised her legs,” said Dr Abbasi.

A survivor said she had little hope to survive. “The way they were firing at us I had little hope to survive this time round. Thank God, police guards were there to protect us,” she said.

An official at the Gulshan-i-Maimar police station said the police officials who had been deputed to guard the polio teams quickly hit back at the attackers.

“After exchange of gunfire, five gunmen escaped, however, one of their accomplices slipped down from the motorcycle’s pillion and was arrested,” said the police official.

“As we hunkered down in the school’s ground to escape the gunfire outside I was praying for everyone’s safety,” said another vaccinator.

Police identified the arrested man as Mir Waiz Ahmedzai, an Afghan refugee, and claimed that he belonged to the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan.

Police said they had recovered a hand grenade, a TT pistol and five bullets from his possession.

It was the second violent attack on vaccinators since April 16 when two female siblings had been attacked in a similar manner in Baldia Town’s sector 8. Police had arrested the lone attacker.

In an attack in Gadap town on Dec 17, a young volunteer associated with the anti-polio campaign was shot dead in the third such attack in the area on polio workers last year, stopping the three-day anti-polio campaign in the most volatile union council-4.

In July 2012, a local paramedic associated with polio vaccination was shot dead and a doctor working for the World Health Organisation, Fosten Dido, from Ghana and his driver were wounded in two separate attacks in the Sohrab Goth area.

Despite attacks on their lives, polio workers, who belong to very poor families, do not even give it an afterthought to quit the increasingly risky job as Rs250 a day is a prized money for them.

“I can’t quit the job. The money it offers is quite a help for my family,” said a polio worker who survived a similar attack in the past.