DAWN EDITORIALS PLUS OPINIONS

Dated: Wednesday,3 June, 2020

Composed by: M.Usman and Rabia.K
An alarming decision
Govt’s Ostensibly Imprudent stance on Lockdown Policy:

IN a move that flies in the face of ominous data, Prime Minister Imran Khan has
decided to further ease lockdown restrictions across the country and to reopen
almost all sectors of industry — an unfortunate decision that will see a greater
surge in coronavirus infections. The announcement was made by Mr Khan after a
meeting of the NCC which deliberated on the rapid increase in daily new cases
and deaths, yet did not come up with a prevention strategy. Instead, the plan,
according to the prime minister, is to rely on citizen responsibility. Take
precautions or you will continue to suffer, he said. Learn to live with it, as the virus
will spread till there is a vaccine, he added. What is most shocking is the decision
to resume tourism in the country. The writing is on the wall: thousands more will
contract the infection and a number of people will die if the government does not
come up with effective solutions while it waits for a vaccine that is at least a year
away from production and distribution. It is almost as if the top leadership does not
read the news or the alarming Covid-19 data. Data and news reports are crucial
indicators of what is to come and must be examined closely.

Figures are crying; Govt's Ministers seems turnning blind eyes:

Pakistan is now in the world’s top 10 countries when it comes to new daily deaths
and cases. In May alone, 1,100 people died of Covid-19 in the country, with
54,000 confirmed cases in 30 days. A sample survey carried out by health
authorities in Lahore estimated that around 670,000 people in the city may have
contracted the virus, a figure far higher than the current one. While questions can
be asked about the size of the survey and why its findings are different from
official numbers, it is alarming that the Punjab government ignored this study and
its practical recommendations. The worst is yet to come — a scenario predicted by
Mr Asad Umar, who said violations of SOPs committed by people over Eid would
be felt by mid-June. Oddly, despite this concern, Mr Umar, too, has opposed a
lockdown unless the healthcare system is overwhelmed.

Has Nobility Class have lost time track of the Crisis?

Perhaps our leaders will understand the crisis better if they spend a few hours at
emergency rooms in hospitals in the major cities. Hospital staff are getting infected
and dying; patients are being turned away because of lack of space. But instead of
building healthcare capacity and mulling an effective way to curb transmission,
the government is talking about tourism. Who will travel to Pakistan, where
infection rates are climbing? It is still not too late to lock down and lower the
transmission rate, as has been done in other countries which have flattened the
curve and are slowly reopening. Any later, and the people of this country will have
to pay a high price.

Ominous: giving the worrying impression that something bad or unpleasant is going to
happen; threateningly inauspicious.
Surge: a sudden large increase, typically a brief one which happens during an otherwise
stable or quiescent period: the firm predicted a 20% surge in sales.
Deliberated: engage in long and careful consideration: she deliberated over the menu.
The writing is on the wall (idiom): there are clear signs that something unpleasant or
unwelcome is going to happen."the writing was on the wall for the old system".
Oddly: strangely, queerly; in an odd manner.
Mulling: think about (a fact, proposal, or request) deeply and at length. she began to mull
over the various possibilities.
US press attacked

“The Murder of Journalism”, Clumsy Leadership animosity to Mediapersons:

PUBLIC anger that erupted late last month over the death of George Floyd, who
died after a policeman put his knee on the African American man’s neck for a
prolonged period during an arrest, has refused to subside. While many
demonstrations have been peaceful, others have descended into riots, looting and
arson, with a growing number of American cities rocked by the unrest.
Unfortunately, the reaction by the American leadership, particularly the
incumbent of the White House, has left a lot to be desired, and has, in fact, fanned
the flames. What has been particularly appalling is the apparently deliberate
targeting of mediapersons covering the events. Perhaps the most shocking event
witnessed in this connection was the arrest, on live TV, of CNN reporter Omar
Jimenez and members of his team covering protests in Minneapolis. Troopers in
full riot gear handcuffed Mr Jimenez as he asked them why he was under arrest, in
a scene straight out of a George Orwell novel. But this has hardly been the only
incident of its kind. Activists say mediapersons have been attacked by law
enforcers over 100 times since May 28, with some facing rubber bullets and pepper
spray despite clearly identifying themselves as members of the press. As the
International Press Institute has noted, “The growing list of incidents reveals a
chilling pattern in which reporters were targeted by police.” One MSNBC reporter
recalled, when he told police that he was a mediaperson, the response he got was:
“We don’t care.”

Freedom of Speech Kicked the Bucket in US:

Such behaviour is usually reported from authoritarian states that clamp down on
journalists with impunity, and are dragged over the coals by the US and other
Western states for their animosity towards press freedom. However, in a sign of
the times, it seems that such despicable ways are fast becoming the new normal in
the US, thanks largely to the combative nature of the American president. While
there is no justification for violence, which in fact dishonours the memory of
George Floyd and other victims of police brutality, a much darker picture is
emerging from the protests in America. In a country where free speech is a
constitutional guarantee, the long arm of the law is instead cracking down on those
whose job it is to report the facts. The authorities in the US must ensure that
journalists are allowed to work freely, and not harassed and attacked by those in
uniform.

Erupted: break out or burst forth suddenly and dramatically: fierce fighting erupted between
the army and guerrillas.
Subside: become less intense, violent, or severe: I'll wait a few minutes until the storm
subsides.
Riot: a violent disturbance of the peace by a crowd.
Arson: the criminal act of deliberately setting fire to property.
Incumbent: necessary for (someone) as a duty or responsibility
Fanned the flames (Idiom): to make a dangerous or unpleasant mood or situation worse:
His speeches fanned the flames of racial tension.
Appalling: horrifying; shocking: the cat suffered appalling injuries during the attack.
Chilling manners: depressing; discouraging; cold; distant; as, a chilling breeze
MSNBC: Microsoft/National Broadcasting Company
Clamp down: suppress or prevent something in an oppressive or harsh manner
Impunity: exemption from punishment or freedom from the injurious consequences
Animosity: strong hostility: he no longer felt any animosity towards her.
Despicable: deserving hatred and contempt: a despicable crime.
Man for all seasons
Daycation of Law Minister Farogh Naseem: Swinging between Portfolios:

FAROGH Naseem has resigned as law minister to represent the government in the
presidential references filed against Supreme Court judge Justice Qazi Faez Isa.
This act of his seems to be part of a habit. Last year, he resigned from his portfolio
to represent army chief Gen Qamar Bajwa in the case of the latter’s extension. He
was promptly sworn back into the cabinet after the case was over. It is fairly
obvious now that such is Mr Naseem’s legal prowess that the government cannot
trust any lawyer in the country other than him to take on this important legal
challenge. The credit for this indispensability cannot be taken away from Mr
Nasim who has shown — repeatedly — that he is a man who wears many hats.
When he resigned his office to represent Gen Bajwa, critics garlanded him with
unflattering labels which would have caused many a person to blush. But not
him. Mr Naseem stood his ground, defied all (evened) odds, won the case, and
silenced his critics with the contempt many richly deserved for doubting his
intentions. Wrapped in legal glory, Mr Naseem galloped back into the cabinet like
a conquering hero.

Fierece Rhetorical bashing of Law Minister; Comparing him to horse 🐎:

Now once again he has unsheathed his sword of law, donned his judicial armour,
straddled his statutory stallion and cantered out of the cabinet straight into the
battlefield on Constitution Avenue. It is a short ride from the Prime Minister’s
Secretariat to the court, and a short ride back. Justice Faez Isa may have branded
him a ‘tout’ in his application to the Supreme Court, but Mr Naseem has proved
time and again that he is above such provocations. He is a loyal soldier of the
court, and of the government, and of the court again and this trait endears him to
so many people who matter when it comes to appreciating the endearing traits of
the talented Mr Farogh Naseem. In a landscape of constantly changing seasons, he
is truly a man for all seasons.

Promptly: immediately, without delay; swiftly, quickly; punctually

Sworn(Swear): pledge, vow, take (an oath): he forced them to swear an oath of loyalty
Prowess: skill or expertise in a particular activity or field: his prowess as a fisherman
Indispensability: quality of being absolutely necessary, vitalness, essentialness
Garland: a wreath of flowers and leaves, worn on the head or hung as a decoration.
Unflattering: tending to reveal or represent unfavorably; "an unflattering portrait";
Defied: openly resist or refuse to obey: a woman who defies convention.
Galloped: the fastest pace of a horse or other quadruped, with all the feet off the ground.
Unsheathed: draw or pull out (a knife, sword, or similar weapon) from its covering.
Straddle: an act of sitting or standing with one's legs wide apart.
Stallion: an uncastrated adult male horse
Statue: a written law passed by a legislative body
Cantered out: ride on a horse at such a speed

Tout person: to talk about (something or someone) as being very good, effective, skillful,
etc. British : to try to persuade people to buy your goods or services.

Endear: with OBJ. cause to be loved or liked: Flora's spirit and character endeared her to
everyone who met her.
American backlash
Mahir Ali

The writer severely criticism of American Racial History exposed the

ugliest face of ture capitalist society, having nothing to do with humanity.

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Historical background and lyrical evidences of racism

BACK in the 1940s, an American blues singer by the name of Big Bill Broonzy
came up with a song that initially no recording label wished to release.

This is how it begins: “This little song that I’m singin’ about/ People you know
it’s true./ If you’re black and gotta work for a living/ This is what they will say
to you.” It then goes straight to the chorus: “They says, ‘If you was white, you’d
be all right/ If you was brown, stick around,/ But as you’s black, oh brother, get
back, get back, get back’.”

Much has changed since then, but too much hasn’t. Some 20 years later, at the
cusp of the 1960s, author James Baldwin concluded an extended essay in The
New Yorker thus: “If we — and now I mean the relatively conscious whites and
the relatively conscious blacks, who must, like lovers, insist on, or create, the
consciousness of the others — do not falter in our duty now, we may be able,
handful that we are, to end the racial nightmare, and achieve our country, and
change the history of the world. If we do not now dare everything, the fulfilment
of that prophecy, recreated from the Bible in song by a slave, is upon us: God
gave Noah the rainbow sign, No more water, the fire next time!”

The fires burning across the US undermine its claim to be a model democracy.

Martin Luther King’s dream of abolition of racial discrimination altered

the American History

A great deal happened in that decade. There was the March on Washington,
where Martin Luther King articulated his dream of the day when “justice rolls
down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream”. This was followed by
the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act, key pieces of legislation that
were deemed to have changed the course of American history.

American civil war and assassination of Dr. King surged racism a century
ago

Technically, perhaps they did. But just as the period of reconstruction that
followed the American civil war of the 1860s ended all too soon in tears and
renewed discrimination against ex-slaves, the practical consequences of the
legal changes 100 years later fell far short of black aspirations. America erupted
in violence in 1965 and 1967, and most notably in 1968, following the
assassination of Dr King exactly a year after the day he had called out his
nation’s government as “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today”.

“These cities are burning now/ All over the USA,” Jimmy Collier and the
Reverend Frederick Douglas Kirkpatrick sang that year. “You know if the white
folks don’t settle up soon/ We all goin’ to wake up to Judgement Day.” Just a
few years later, Bob Dylan described the status quo in these words: “If you’re
black you might as well not show up on the street/ Unless you wanna draw the
heat.”

Contemporary case of racism in Minnesota; Minnesota ; lynching of

George Floyd by a cop

Dylan was born and brought up in Minnesota, and briefly attended university in
Minneapolis, the city where George Floyd was publicly lynched last week.
That’s where police officer Derek Chauvin brought his knee down on Floyd’s
neck, and kept it there for eight minutes and 46 seconds, three minutes longer
than it took Floyd to die.

Evidences of prevailing racial discrimination in America

“That’s not a chip on my shoulder, that’s your foot on my neck,” a currently

popular meme cites Malcolm X as saying. That is by no means the only echo
from those times that continues to ring true. In 1970, Baldwin wrote to the
incarcerated Angela Davis: “We know that we, the blacks, and not only we, the
blacks, have been, and are, the victims of a system whose only fuel is greed,
whose only god is profit. We know that the fruits of this system have been
ignorance, despair, and death, and we know that the system is doomed because
the world can no longer afford it….”

Racial inequality may doom democracy ;glimpses of Minnesota

He was wrong, as he probably would have admitted if he had lived this long,
about “the world can no longer afford it” bit, but in the past few days we have
seen reminders of how the system may be doomed. Not that Donald Trump and
his allies, nor for that the leading Democrats, will acknowledge as much.

US claims of its model democracy appears bogus

Even Trump and his acolytes were obliged to acknowledge, more or less, that
Floyd’s murder was an atrocity. Not surprisingly, though, they have little to say
about the fact that it took several days for the Minnesota authorities to charge
Chauvin with murder — third degree, mind you — and the three colleagues who
facilitated the crime had not been apprehended at the time of writing, and
rioting.

Egregious Violation of human rights by police left unquestionable

Far too often, policemen are not charged for such egregious violations of human
rights, or get off lightly, if not scot-free. And the authorities are invariably more
outraged by the backlash, peaceful or violent, than by the unpunished crime.

Vandalizing and fire-erupting buildings could signal an inevitable storm

The fires burning in towns and cities right across the US starkly illuminate the
absurdity of its claim to be a model democracy. The multicoloured backlash is
beautiful to behold, yet it may just lead to another uncomfortable calm before
the next inevitable storm.
A global response
Jameel Ahmad

The writer want to drag our attention to COVID-19 as a global crisis and
educate us with different prospective of Future.

Global health crisis amid Covid-19

KNOWING no boundaries, Covid-19 has caused a global health crisis and
exposed the vulnerabilities of healthcare systems, allowing little time to
organise effective response measures. An avalanche of cases has overwhelmed
healthcare structures in developed countries. In developing nations with long
neglected public health sectors, the pandemic is leading to mayhem due to a
shortage of medical equipment and personnel, and obsolete infrastructures.
Health care facilities and economic activities shaken to the core
The endeavour to save lives through lockdowns has inflicted huge economic
and human suffering. Millions have lost jobs. Efforts to alleviate poverty and
reduce hunger have been impaired. Financial markets have been shaken.
Developmental gains have been reversed, and the future of millions of poor
thrown into uncertainty.
Today’s challenges need inclusive multilateralism.
Recent research on vulnerable countries affected by pandemic:
A recent research study by King’s College London and the Australian National
University, published by the United Nations University World Institute for
Development Economics Research, starkly warns that an additional 500 million
people in developing countries could be pushed into poverty because of the
economic crunch of the global pandemic. The scramble to mitigate the
pandemic underscores the need for affordable and accessible healthcare for all,
since vulnerable communities are disproportionately impacted in such
catastrophic situations. Poverty and growing inequalities have exposed the
failings of the current development model.
Sustainable development agenda 2030 remains challenging
The 2030 agenda for sustainable development was adopted in 2015 as an
integrated response to poverty, environmental degradation, hunger and disease.
Its 17 Sustainable Development Goals provide a roadmap to development that
leaves no one behind. Since then, an entirely new international architecture has
evolved for its implementation. But despite some progress, achieving the SDGs
remains a challenging goal.
Environmental sustainability the need of an hour for economies
Climate change poses an existential threat to humanity, yet unabated carbon
emissions make the targets of the Paris Agreement more elusive today than
when it was signed in 2015. Our unsustainable patterns of consumption and
production disregard Earth’s regenerative capacity. Healthy ecosystems provide
a natural shield against the spread of pathogens, yet science suggests that
Earth’s ecosystems are nearing critical levels of depletion. The
Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services warned
last year about the deteriorating health of Earth due to indiscriminate and
unsustainable exploitation of natural resources. The well-being of humanity, its
economic development and a healthy environment ultimately depend upon our
ability to decouple economic growth and social advancement from the
increasing use of natural resources.

Adapting to healthy lifestyles can curtail environmental degradation

Swift behavioural change is necessary to address environmental degradation,
biodiversity loss and climate change. That change can start with each of us
changing our lifestyles and the decisions we make as consumers. Sustainable
lifestyles mean doing more and better with less; more goods and services, with
less impact in terms of resource use, environmental degradation, waste and
pollution.
Six-point plan by UN secretary Antonio Guterres
To recover from the impacts of the pandemic, nations need to reassess their
development options and priorities. A ‘green’ economic recovery will be key to
harnessing science, technology, finance and innovation in partnership with the
private sector, industry and civil society. UN Secretary General António
Guterres has urged countries to “turn the recovery into a real opportunity to do
things right for the future” through a six-point plan, with emphasis on delivering
new jobs and businesses through a clean, green transition; using fiscal firepower
to drive the shift towards a greener economy; making societies and people more
resilient; incorporating climate risks and opportunities into policymaking; and
the “need to work together as an international community”.
Multilateralism : the solution to emerging global crisis
Covid-19, climate change and poverty are global issues warranting global
responses. The 2030 agenda symbolises the world’s commitment to collaborate
on efforts to address humanity’s biggest challenges. However, these efforts will
only be successful when underpinned by an inclusive collaboration among
governments, regional cooperation organisations, economic and political
entities, scientists, industry, private sector and civil society, to name a few.
There are important lessons to be learned from this pandemic. Covid-19 has
shown how we truly are one people and that we must come together to face our
challenges, be it the visible threat of the virus or the existential threat of climate
change.
Conclusion
Seventy-five years since it was established, the UN’s role will be vital in
enabling the international community to work together to address global issues
and make the world a better place for all. If there was ever a time to strengthen
multilateralism and promote multilateral cooperation for human well-being, it is
now.
Secrets and society
Rafia Zakaria

The writer is an attorney teaching constitutional law and political philosophy.

EVERY society has secrets, but some societies have more than others. Ours is
such a society. Relationships are important, and to maintain them a lot of secrets
have to be kept. Arranged marriages, care-taking obligations towards parents,
surviving in homes with many siblings with many views that are easy to offend
and that also offend. Added up, the careful arithmetic of relationships is no less
than a tightrope, and to be a part of society most of us have to walk it, even if
reluctantly.

This delicate equilibrium of a vast web of relationships has likely never faced an
upheaval of the sort brought on by the coronavirus pandemic. Quarantine in
close proximity to family members means less freedom to scurry away here or
there, to talk to this one while at work or that one at a friend’s house. One
bizarre set of events unfolded last week, when a woman, allegedly a wronged
wife, stormed into the home of another woman (allegedly in a relationship with
her husband) and proceeded to scream and threaten and maraud the place.

Women are expected to be open books, the details of their lives fodder
to keep gossip machines going.

All of it was recorded on a mobile phone camera and thus, in an instant,

available for all to see. In Pakistan, secrets are never revealed on a small scale
anymore; they are literally released to everyone, so that one and all can snicker
and smile and pretend to be outraged. When someone falls off the tightrope in a
society rife with secrets, we all like to watch it all unfold.

The incident mentioned is probably just one example; the pandemic has likely
taken a toll on many secret relationships. Among these are the secret wives of
wealthy men, married without the permission of their first wives. Polygamy
creates a whole host of problems, one of which is the condemnation of one or
another of the wives to a clandestine existence. The strictures of the pandemic
have meant that many polygamous husbands have been forced to live in close
proximity to their ‘official’ wives. With proximity comes the possibility that the
entire production falls apart — an intercepted telephone call, a text, restlessness;
all can reveal the lies behind lives and cause the entire house of cards to
crumble into a sad pile.

The uncertain nature of the pandemic is increasing the stress on the delicate
equilibrium that keeps everyone happy and information limited to those who
need it. In a country full of strictures, young love often requires the venue of
college or university or school to flourish. With everything shut down and
everyone in the family getting into each other’s business, these relationships can
be throttled, killed before they have ever had the opportunity to flourish into
something more. The collective agony of young people separated from their
crushes seems to linger in the air everywhere. Thrown into close proximity with
parents and subject to closer surveillance than usual, with lost independence and
freedom, young people — women in particular — are suffering.

Mobile phones, social media and the internet have put the ordinary man or
woman in contact with others whom they would never have encountered
otherwise. Expectedly, they have become venues in which relationships,
friendships and enmities of various sorts have flourished. The pandemic, with
its uncertain parameters and the incipient fear of contagion that comes with it —
one could, after all, fall sick and drop dead — should force everyone to consider
the value of these relationships and their ability to maintain them.

With hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis refusing to pretend in front of spouses

or parents or friends, intentionally jumping off the tightrope forced on everyone
may free not only the person jumping off but so many others inspired by one act
of bravado.

The primary ailment of a secret society is its refusal to allow anyone to have
boundaries or zones of privacy. Women especially are expected to be open
books, the details of their lives fodder to keep gossip machines going. The idea
that an individual is entitled to keep certain information about themselves to
themselves is anathema. It is an ultimate and hilarious irony that a society full of
secrets requires everyone to pretend that they have no secrets at all.

No one needs to be told that the world and all of us are transforming at warp
speed, pushed along both by technological advances and a global pandemic of
unprecedented scale. Privacy is healthy, secrets not so much. Moments of
transformation can be used to usher in a better system, a change in what we
consider good and right and possible.

This requires admitting that we all have things about ourselves that we wish to
keep to ourselves and this desire for privacy does not mean that we do not love
or care for those we do not confess to. Privacy of course is not a legitimisation
of the immoral, abuse, torment and other cruelties, which must be exposed so
that the vulnerable can be helped and perpetrators held to account.

A society for secrets is no longer sustainable. Who knows how long we may
have to spend time primarily in close proximity with immediate family
members. This sort of life can be made far better, far more pleasant, when all
family members recognise that we are all entitled to keep certain things to
ourselves and that we are able to police our own actions through our individual
conscience.

Without such an understanding, the cumulative pressure of a mobile phone in

each person’s hand and a pandemic prowling though the streets will create
social collapse on a scale we have not seen before. In a society with only secrets
and no personal privacy, the bad and the ugly are always hidden and cannot be
seen. This, however, does not mean that they cease to exist or to hurt and harass
or to cause a slow and steady rot from the inside.
Blundering into disaster
Zahid Hussain

The writer is an author and journalist.

IT was a surreal moment listening to the prime minister as he warned the nation
of more coronavirus deaths while removing restrictions that could contain the
spread of the deadly infection. His latest words highlight the recklessness that
defines the federal government’s approach while dealing with an existential
crisis.
With almost all restrictions on movement gone, it has now been left to the
people to save themselves from the fast-spreading disease. The state has
virtually abdicated its responsibility of protecting the people. The prime
minister’s latest remarks that he never favoured a lockdown are consistent with
his original view that Covid-19 is just another form of the flu.
Not so much in a state of denial, the current leadership seems to be pursuing
‘voodoo’ methods. It’s hard to believe that it would not have seen the alarming
report on the large-scale prevalence of the disease presented by Punjab’s health
department almost two weeks ago, before going for an almost complete
reopening.
Thanks to policy confusion, we haven’t been able to contain the virus.
The report had estimated that 670,800 people in Lahore alone might have been
infected by the infection. “No workplace and residential area of any town is
disease-free,” the report based on both random and targeted testing had warned.
In most communities, the infection rate is 5.18 per cent. The Lahore situation is
just the tip of the iceberg. The situation may be even worse in Karachi with its
much larger population.
In order to contain the further spread of the infection, the report presented to the
provincial government on May 15 had asked for the imposition of a stricter
lockdown for at least four weeks before Eid. Doctors and epidemiologists too
have long been warning about the impending public health disaster and had
desperately been calling for tougher measures.
Instead, the government further loosened restrictions on businesses, sweeping
aside all precautions. Shoppers thronging markets and traffic clogging the roads
in all the big cities presented a lawless sight. The clusters thus formed created a
favourable environment for the virus to spread. The Supreme Court ruling days
before Eid, ordering even malls to open appeared to give further impunity to the
disorder. In the absence of law enforcement, the so-called SOPs were never
taken seriously.
It was not just the shopping centres; even congregational prayers in mosques
were allowed and shrines were opened for visitors. One wonders what that had
to do with the economy and well-being of the ‘poor people’ that has become a
common refrain in government circles as they remove restrictions.
Given this lax behaviour, it is not surprising that there has been an astronomical
rise in the number of registered coronavirus cases and the death toll since the
government set aside even a pretence of lockdown. The number is likely to
multiply further as the effects of a complete reopening takes time to crystallise.
Going by the Punjab health department’s report, the situation appears extremely
alarming.
Two days before the prime minister announced a virtual lifting of the lockdown,
Pakistan experienced its deadliest day (92 deaths, doctors’ among them) and the
highest single-day rise in Covid-19 cases at 3,039. There was no mention of that
in the prime minister’s speech as he once again blasted his own government’s
decision to impose the lockdown.
Indeed, the chaos is more pronounced with a policy based on the leadership’s
whims rather than prudence. Now the prime minister wants to restart tourism
despite the reservations by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Gilgit-Baltistan
governments. It seems that our leaders are making it clear that human lives and
public health matter little.
Pakistan is perhaps the only country that has prematurely reopened most spheres
of life when the disease is far from reaching its peak. The latest data on Covid-
19 prevalence in South Asian countries released by the Centres for Disease
Control and Prevention belies the prime minister’s claim that lockdowns have
not worked in containing the pandemic.
India and Bangladesh having imposed stricter lockdowns have now a lesser
percentage of cases in terms of population than in Pakistan where it has seen a
rapid increase in the past two weeks. The prevalence rate in Pakistan is almost
double that in India. Sri Lanka with its timely actions has flattened the curve
thanks to measures taken earlier.
These countries may be in a much better position to gradually start reopening.
They have more or less the same proportion of younger population as Pakistan
making them relatively less vulnerable to the disease. But that has not stopped
them from taking preventive measures unlike us.
Because of the confusion in policy, we could neither contain the disease nor
create conditions for the quick revival of the economy. Most amusing is the
claims of some federal ministers that the entire world is now following the
‘vision’ of their great leader. What they don’t want to understand is that the
spread of the disease will not only have serious consequences for public health
but also for quicker economic recovery.
The top leadership’s constant refrain is that it is the poorest section of the
population that gets affected by the restrictions and the closure of economy. One
cannot deny that fact, but what is not being realised by our leaders is that the
uncontrollable spread of the disease would have far more serious consequences
for the working classes. The Punjab health department’s report clearly shows
that the infection is much more rampant among the lower-class neighborhoods
and congested localities.
This situation could have easily been contained with timely action. Had the
government been more serious about the lockdown in the first two months,
things would have been much better now for people to go back to work sooner.
This unregulated and premature reopening has created far more problems for the
country. There is still time to review this controversial approach to the crisis
before the situation gets completely out of control.