MANDI BAHAUDDIN: A lady health worker was assaulted by local women in Punjab’s Mandi Bahauddin district during an HPV vaccination drive aimed at preventing cervical cancer in young girls.
On September 15, Pakistan’s Expanded Programme on Immunisation launched the vaccination campaign against Human Papillomavirus (HPV) in most parts of the country to protect young girls from cervical cancer.
Kuthiala Sheikhan Police Station House Officer (SHO) Sabir Hussain Sandhu said that the incident took place in Chak No-38.
He said that Lady Health Worker Ghulam Sugra was beaten and pushed to the ground by neighbourhood women while she was administering vaccines at a school.
According to the SHO, a First Information Report (FIR) has been registered on the worker’s complaint, though no arrests have been made so far.
The FIR was lodged at Kuthiala Sheikhan police station under Sections 186 (obstructing a public servant in discharge of duties) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Pakistan Penal Code.
In her statement, Ghulam Sugra said that she was present in Chak No-38 with her team to administer vaccines to children at a primary school, when a woman named Parveen along with 15 others attacked them.
“Parveen pushed me to the ground and started punching me. The other women also hit me and hurled abuses,” the complainant said.
The vaccination drive is being carried out in three phases. The first phase, from September 15 to 27, 2025, is under way in Punjab, Sindh, Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Islamabad. The second phase will be extended to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in 2026, while the third phase will cover Balochistan and Gilgit-Baltistan in 2027.
The campaign aims to vaccinate 90 per cent of girls aged 9 to 14 years in the first-phase regions by the end of 2025 and sustain this coverage in the coming years through routine immunisation.