A teacher has described the "shocking" moment he witnessed dozens of his female pupils falling ill from suspected poisoning.
About 80 girls and several teachers from primary schools in the northern Afghan province of Sar-e-Pul were reportedly poisoned in two incidents at the weekend, local officials confirmed to The National.
“On Saturday, around 8am, we asked all the students to gather in the schoolyard for an assembly, addressing some issues in the school, but before we could even finish our speeches, one of the students fainted and fell to the ground,” said Qurban Ali, a 35-year-old teacher at one of the schools.
“We put some water on her face, we thought it must be because of hunger since she hadn’t eaten. But just as we were taking her to her family, another girl collapsed."
He and his colleagues rushed the two girls to a nearby pharmacy to receive medicine. It is common in Afghanistan to receive medical attention for small ailments from pharmacists.
“But by the time we returned, more girls had collapsed and others were starting to show symptoms of dizziness, headaches, abdominal pain and vomiting ,” he said. “We realised they all seemed to have been poisoned. It was shocking.”
After dismissing those who were healthy, Mr Ali and his colleague took the affected pupils to hospital.
“The pharmacy was not equipped to handle so many patients,” he said. "We got some help from local doctors as well, who prescribed medicine to girls with milder symptoms."
While many have since been discharged, a few girls were kept in for observation. Their condition was said to be stable.
Neither the perpetrator nor the motive is known.
But women and girls’ freedom have come under increasing attack since the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan in August 2021. The majority of the women and girls in Afghanistan – above grade six – are banned from seeking education as high schools and universities remain closed to them. Employment and work opportunities have also been limited and the Taliban has imposed restrictions on women’s movement and presence in public and political spaces.
These were not the first such incidents of mass poisoning of schoolgirls in Afghanistan, with similar cases reported in Takhar, Herat and Balkh from as far back as 2010. Officials then had blamed Taliban militants.
However, subsequent investigations found no toxins in the girls who showed the symptoms. Later, the World Health Organisation said the poisonings were more likely a form of mass psychogenic illness.
While the source of the latest illnesses in the case of Sar-e-Pul schools remains unclear, Mr Ali suspects it may have been airborne.
“Our school is in a mountainous place, barely has any walls and the glass on the windows is broken, even the classrooms don’t have doors,” he said, urging government officials to invest in the school’s infrastructure. "About 200 students study in this way, exposed to the elements. It is possible the poison spread through the air."
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From: Dara
To: Team@
Date: March 25, 2019 at 11:45pm PT
Subj: Accelerating in the Middle East
Five years ago, Uber launched in the Middle East. It was the start of an incredible journey, with millions of riders and drivers finding new ways to move and work in a dynamic region that’s become so important to Uber. Now Pakistan is one of our fastest-growing markets in the world, women are driving with Uber across Saudi Arabia, and we chose Cairo to launch our first Uber Bus product late last year.
Today we are taking the next step in this journey—well, it’s more like a leap, and a big one: in a few minutes, we’ll announce that we’ve agreed to acquire Careem. Importantly, we intend to operate Careem independently, under the leadership of co-founder and current CEO Mudassir Sheikha. I’ve gotten to know both co-founders, Mudassir and Magnus Olsson, and what they have built is truly extraordinary. They are first-class entrepreneurs who share our platform vision and, like us, have launched a wide range of products—from digital payments to food delivery—to serve consumers.
I expect many of you will ask how we arrived at this structure, meaning allowing Careem to maintain an independent brand and operate separately. After careful consideration, we decided that this framework has the advantage of letting us build new products and try new ideas across not one, but two, strong brands, with strong operators within each. Over time, by integrating parts of our networks, we can operate more efficiently, achieve even lower wait times, expand new products like high-capacity vehicles and payments, and quicken the already remarkable pace of innovation in the region.
This acquisition is subject to regulatory approval in various countries, which we don’t expect before Q1 2020. Until then, nothing changes. And since both companies will continue to largely operate separately after the acquisition, very little will change in either teams’ day-to-day operations post-close. Today’s news is a testament to the incredible business our team has worked so hard to build.
It’s a great day for the Middle East, for the region’s thriving tech sector, for Careem, and for Uber.
Uber on,
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