LAHORE - A 7-year-old boy lost his life in the arms of his helpless mother 'madly' kissing his dead body after bitten by a stray dog and non-availability of anti-rabies vaccination in the public and private health institutes of Kasur district. The incident of an innocent boy, Ali Sher's death has exposed tall claims of the Punjab health department as well as the district governments of providing basic health facilities especially to the people of far-flung areas. The minor, another victim of the 'negligence' of the health department, was son of a poor labourer Muhammad Afzal of Bhela Athar, Kasur. Two-months long 'futile' struggle of the parents to save their minor child is a big question on the performance of the departments concerned that miserably failed in providing anti-rabies vaccination to the people of far-flung areas of the province leaving them at the mercy of the 'God'. The horrible tale of the victim family did not end here. The lives of the parents and their other children in the family are also at risk as they themselves contracted rabies infections in the process of his treatment with the kid showing full-blown symptoms of rabies kept biting them. The incident of dog-bite took place a couple of months ago when the minor Ali Sher was playing outside his Bhela Athar residence and around four to five stray dogs attacked him. One of the stray dogs bit him and later disappeared from the scene. The injured boy was immediately rushed to the local dispensary situated in the same village for vaccination. The dispensary had no vaccine in its stocks. The family later took the boy to the dispensaries of other nearby villages but found no vaccine there. Some weeks after their struggle, the poor family brought their child to District Hospital Kasur for vaccination but ironically, the hospital management also refused the family saying that they did not have the required medicine. Meanwhile, the local doctors told the victim's family that the child need immediate vaccination and any delay could prove fatal for the child. Meanwhile, the child began to show some symptoms of rabbis which got developed due to many weeks' delay in getting the treatment. After hectic efforts, the victim family managed to find a dispensary situated in a village, Fateh Pur where anti-rabies vaccination was available but it was too late. After the 9th injection, the condition of the child got critical. As the condition went worse, the dispensary doctors suggested the victim family to start a substitute anti-rabies vaccination, which was too costly. Despite financial constraints, the helpless family searched the prescribed vaccine in all the public and private medical centers of the city but the vaccination was not available. Nobody could imagine the miseries of the mother of the child who was running from one place to the other carrying her minor in her arms in search of vaccination. Meanwhile, the victim boy started biting his mother and other family members due to rabies disease, which by then had fully developed. "It is only the God who knows better my feelings when I taped mouth of my crying son to avoid his bites", Muhammad Afzal said this while taking to The Nation. Afzal said that he couldn't forget the scene in rest his of life when he saw his son in the arms of his mother who was kissing the dying baby helplessly with tears in her eyes. "My baby breathed his last in the arms of his mother", Afzal said and started weeping. Awais Qerni, a member of Human Rights Commission of Pakistan who was eyewitness of the incident and resident of same village said that he would take up the issue with the authorities concerned. While expressing his strong reservation, he said that non-availability of dog-bite vaccination in all the public and private hospitals in Kasur was a matter of great concern. He also alleged that the vaccination provided to the minor in the dispensary of Fatah Pur village was substandard.