16/10/2012

Doctors 'Hopeful' For Malala Yousafzai Recovery

Doctors have said they are hopeful 14-year-old Malala Yousafzai will recover following treatment in the UK.

The Pakistani school girl was shot in the head and neck by a Taliban gunman who boarded the school bus she was travelling in and asked for her by name.

A bullet was removed from her skull last week but it was recommended she be "shifted abroad to a UK centre which has the capability to provide integrated care to children who have sustained severe injury".

Hospital Medical Director Dr David Rosser said some UK colleagues who had been in Pakistan believed she had "a chance of making a good recovery".

"Clearly it would be inappropriate on every level, not least for her, to put her through all of this if there was no hope of decent recovery," he told reporters shortly before Malala's arrival at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham on Monday.

Malala became widely known as a campaigner for girls' education in Pakistan as a result of a diary she wrote for BBC Urdu about life under the Taliban, when they banned all girls from attending school.

It is understood she was targeted for "promoting secularism", and the Taliban have said they will target her again should she recover.

(H)

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