In Nigeria, gunmen have again abducted at least eight people from a hospital in the northwest of the country, police say.
This took place at the National Tuberculosis and Leprosy Centre in Zaria early on Sunday morning.
![Zaria Kaduna Nigeria](https://satofsat.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Nigeria-Gunmen-kidnap-nurses-and-children-from-hospital.gif)
Other reports say the number of people taken by the group is higher and includes nurses and children.
There has been a recent wave of abductions from schools and universities for ransom.
Police said the gunmen, thought to be from criminal groups known locally as “bandits”, opened fire on a police station in the city.
While they were engaged in the shootout, another group attacked the hospital.
“The attack on the police station was a distraction whilst another group attacked the dormitories of the health centre workers,” a local resident told AFP news agency.
The group escaped with the victims into a nearby forest.
A hospital worker, says the gunmen had abducted at least 12 people, including three children under the age of three and a teenager.
A local government official said troops were stepping up efforts to find the victims.
Kidnappings are common in the north of the country.
Last February, nearly 300 schoolchildren were abducted from a school in Zamfara state.
Authorities say recent attacks on schools in the north-west have been carried out by bandits, a loose term for kidnappers, armed robbers, cattle rustlers and other armed militia operating in the region who are largely motivated by money.
Since the well-publicised abduction in 2014 of 276 schoolgirls from Chibok secondary school by Boko Haram Islamist militants in Borno state, more armed groups have resorted to mass abduction of students.