BUTUAN CITY – Health workers implementing the “Sabayang Patak Kontra Polio” (mass polio vaccination) were ambushed by heavily armed men believed to be members of the New People’s Army in Kalipayan, Zapanta Valley, Kitcharao, Agusan del Norte, Wednesday, police reported yesterday.
No one was reported hurt when the vehicle of the health workers of the Kitcharao Municipal Health Office was peppered with bullets by the attackers.
The health workers, Ingrid R. Archinue, 46, head nurse; Jennifer M. Veterbo, 28 midwife; and their companions on board a dark gray Toyota Innova were in a convoy with another multicab also carrying barangay health workers on their way back to their office when the ambush took place at 2 p.m.
Archinue managed to drive the Toyota Innova to a safer place after the attackers fired shots at its windshield.
The health workers have been conducting mass oral polio vaccination in the area, police said.
Dr. Jose R. Llacuna Jr., director of the Department of Health Region 13, said the anti-polio vaccination program in Caraga region “will go on without letup.”
“This incident will not deter our program and will go on until we achieved our goal,” said Llacuna who immediately went to Kitcharao to personally check the situation of the health workers.
He instructed all health workers in far-flung areas to “take extra precautionary measures” to avoid being harmed by lawless elements.
DoH 13 spokesperson Romelyn Esther C. Torralba said 226,474 children benefited from the oral polio vaccination program. It represents 69.24 percent accomplishment in two days after the Sabayang Patak Kontra Polio was officially launched last Monday.
The all-out oral polio vaccination is the government’s direct response to the outbreak of polio in the country this year. (Mike Crismundo)
