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May 23 started out much like any other day at the government-run Bibi Hajira girls’ school. In contrast with other parts of Afghanistan, life tends to be relatively tranquil here in Taloqan, the capital of the northern border province of Takhar. But around 7:30 a.m., as the girls of class 12A were taking an early-morning break, their classmate Seddiqa, the principal’s daughter, walked into the room and fainted. Her friends managed to catch her before she hit the floor.
Then another girl collapsed. Students in other classrooms began saying they felt dizzy. Someone said something about poison gas, and teachers and students began to panic. “Cover your noses, girls!” the teachers shouted as everyone fled outside.
By midmorning, dozens of ailing girls were stretched out in the courtyard while medical teams, police, and reporters swarmed through the school. “I felt my nose burning and a strong headache,” a 12th grader named Qarema tells Newsweek. “I sat down, and the next thing I knew, I woke up in the hospital.” Before the day was over, 127 of the school’s roughly 1,200 students had been taken to the hospital, complaining of fainting, dizziness, and anxiety. Most recovered and were released within hours, but authorities were convinced the girls had been poisoned. It wasn’t the first time, they said: in April 161 girls had fallen ill at another high school in the same province. Local officials accused the Taliban of poisoning the school’s well. The Taliban denied it, but what can you expect from the kind of men who have burned down scores of girls’ schools in recent years?
Six days after the Bibi Hajira incident, 39 girls fell ill at another school in the city. Three days after that, 95 students at yet another school were hospitalized. Fear swept the province. Parents kept their daughters home, armed guards were posted at the schools every night, and nervous students took turns searching each other every morning. But the incidents continued. Between April and June, seven schools and more than 1,000 girls reported the same frightening symptoms. Parents and politicians demanded government action, and health and security officials were sent up from Kabul.
Things finally came to a head on June 6. Afghanistan’s equivalent of the FBI, the National Directorate of Security, announced the arrests of 15 suspects in the incidents, including two 17-year-old Taloqan schoolgirls: an 11th grader named Shukria and a 12th grader named Seema Gul. At a high-profile press conference attended by Takhar officials and members of the national media, the NDS distributed videotapes of some suspects’ purported confessions. According to the NDS, Shukria and Seema Gul were paid the equivalent of $1,000 each to release poison in their schools. One of the videos shows Seema Gul, a Bibi Hajira student, sitting in a dimly lit room as she tells how an alleged Taliban agent coerced her into poisoning her classmates. “I was followed by Mullah Najib to my school, and he gave me a pot and threatened he would kill or kidnap me,” she says, her voice hoarse and frantic. “I had to do it.”
A Kabul school, one of many that have been swept by weird ailments. (Guillermo Cervera for Newsweek)
But did she actually commit such a crime? Medical investigators tell Newsweek they have no evidence that anyone was poisoned at any of the schools in question. In fact, the United Nations and the World Health Organization have been investigating such alleged mass poisonings in Afghanistan since 2009. According to official sources and confidential documents obtained by Newsweek, their researchers have never found any actual toxins despite extensive lab tests.
The U.N. and WHO reports, which have never been made public, say the victims in these cases have exhibited none of the symptoms typically associated with poisoning, such as vomiting, internal organ damage, or bloody diarrhea. What’s more, no deaths have been recorded among the thousands of Afghan schoolgirls who have complained of mysterious ailments. Instead, the victims usually recover quickly enough to leave the hospital the same day. “More than 200 samples (blood, urine, and water from the source) have so far been collected,” a WHO spokesperson told Newsweek in an email. “No conclusive evidence of deliberate poisoning was found.”
On the contrary, investigators think the incidents have a very different cause. They point to the symptoms (anxiety, fainting, dizziness), the large numbers of sufferers in each incident, and the fact that almost all the victims are young women, while male staff members seem untouched. The conclusion is that the supposed poisonings are actually manifestations of what doctors call “mass psychogenic illness.” It’s a little-understood problem that has been documented across a range of cultures and historical periods—and not only in developing countries. For example, medical experts believed it to be responsible for a mysterious “twitching illness” that afflicted a group of cheerleaders in the town of Le Roy, N.Y., this past January.
Then another girl collapsed. Students in other classrooms began saying they felt dizzy. Someone said something about poison gas, and teachers and students began to panic. “Cover your noses, girls!” the teachers shouted as everyone fled outside.
By midmorning, dozens of ailing girls were stretched out in the courtyard while medical teams, police, and reporters swarmed through the school. “I felt my nose burning and a strong headache,” a 12th grader named Qarema tells Newsweek. “I sat down, and the next thing I knew, I woke up in the hospital.” Before the day was over, 127 of the school’s roughly 1,200 students had been taken to the hospital, complaining of fainting, dizziness, and anxiety. Most recovered and were released within hours, but authorities were convinced the girls had been poisoned. It wasn’t the first time, they said: in April 161 girls had fallen ill at another high school in the same province. Local officials accused the Taliban of poisoning the school’s well. The Taliban denied it, but what can you expect from the kind of men who have burned down scores of girls’ schools in recent years?
Six days after the Bibi Hajira incident, 39 girls fell ill at another school in the city. Three days after that, 95 students at yet another school were hospitalized. Fear swept the province. Parents kept their daughters home, armed guards were posted at the schools every night, and nervous students took turns searching each other every morning. But the incidents continued. Between April and June, seven schools and more than 1,000 girls reported the same frightening symptoms. Parents and politicians demanded government action, and health and security officials were sent up from Kabul.
Things finally came to a head on June 6. Afghanistan’s equivalent of the FBI, the National Directorate of Security, announced the arrests of 15 suspects in the incidents, including two 17-year-old Taloqan schoolgirls: an 11th grader named Shukria and a 12th grader named Seema Gul. At a high-profile press conference attended by Takhar officials and members of the national media, the NDS distributed videotapes of some suspects’ purported confessions. According to the NDS, Shukria and Seema Gul were paid the equivalent of $1,000 each to release poison in their schools. One of the videos shows Seema Gul, a Bibi Hajira student, sitting in a dimly lit room as she tells how an alleged Taliban agent coerced her into poisoning her classmates. “I was followed by Mullah Najib to my school, and he gave me a pot and threatened he would kill or kidnap me,” she says, her voice hoarse and frantic. “I had to do it.”
A Kabul school, one of many that have been swept by weird ailments. (Guillermo Cervera for Newsweek)
But did she actually commit such a crime? Medical investigators tell Newsweek they have no evidence that anyone was poisoned at any of the schools in question. In fact, the United Nations and the World Health Organization have been investigating such alleged mass poisonings in Afghanistan since 2009. According to official sources and confidential documents obtained by Newsweek, their researchers have never found any actual toxins despite extensive lab tests.
The U.N. and WHO reports, which have never been made public, say the victims in these cases have exhibited none of the symptoms typically associated with poisoning, such as vomiting, internal organ damage, or bloody diarrhea. What’s more, no deaths have been recorded among the thousands of Afghan schoolgirls who have complained of mysterious ailments. Instead, the victims usually recover quickly enough to leave the hospital the same day. “More than 200 samples (blood, urine, and water from the source) have so far been collected,” a WHO spokesperson told Newsweek in an email. “No conclusive evidence of deliberate poisoning was found.”
On the contrary, investigators think the incidents have a very different cause. They point to the symptoms (anxiety, fainting, dizziness), the large numbers of sufferers in each incident, and the fact that almost all the victims are young women, while male staff members seem untouched. The conclusion is that the supposed poisonings are actually manifestations of what doctors call “mass psychogenic illness.” It’s a little-understood problem that has been documented across a range of cultures and historical periods—and not only in developing countries. For example, medical experts believed it to be responsible for a mysterious “twitching illness” that afflicted a group of cheerleaders in the town of Le Roy, N.Y., this past January.
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