Pakistan’s Malala can make ‘good recovery,’ British doctors say
Pakistani school girls pray for the recovery of gunshot victim, Malala Yousafzai, in Multan on October 10, 2012. Pakistani doctors removed a bullet from a 14-year-old child campaigner shot by the Taliban in a horrific attack condemned by national leaders and rights activists. The attack took place in Mingora, the main town of the Swat valley in Pakistan’s northwest, where Malala had campaigned for the right to an education during a two-year Taliban insurgency which the army said it had crushed in 2009.
Malala Yousafzai, the 14-year-old Pakistani rights campaigner shot by the Taliban, has every chance of making a "good recovery," British doctors said Monday.
The girl was flown from Pakistan to Birmingham's Queen Elizabeth Hospital for additional treatment of her severe head wounds, Reuters reported.
The hospital is home to an expert who has treated hundreds of soldiers wounded in Afghanistan.
"Doctors … believe she has a chance of making a good recovery on every level," said Dr. Dave Rosser, the hospital's medical director.
The military said that damaged bones in Malala's skull will need to be repaired and she will require intensive "neuro rehabilitation", reports AP.
A team of doctors from the United Arab Emirates flew to the military hospital in Rawalpindi where Malala has been slowly recovering.
They accompanied her on the specially equipped air ambulance provided by the UAE, reports the BBC.
Doctors on Sunday were still unsure if it would be safe to transport her.
“She is making slow and steady progress which is in keeping with expectations. Recovery from this type of injury is always slow," Major General Asim Saleem Bajwa told AFP.
Taliban militants shot Malala and two classmates as they walked home from school on October 9. Malala was a Taliban target for her work advocating for girls’ education in Pakistan.
Malala was shot in the head with the bullet piercing her left temple and lodging near her spine, Pakistani military officials have said.
According to the Los Angeles Times, doctors told Pakistani media that she did not suffer any significant brain damage.
But an unnamed source told Al Jazeera that the situation is more dire and that Malala has a "very limited chance of life left."
"[The] face and head swelled a lot. Face complexion [has] become dark. She could be removed from ventilator within a few hours," he said.