TO EXPECT THE UNEXPECTED AND BE PREPARED FOR IT

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/05/23/to-expect-the-unexpected-and-be-prepared-for-it/

How unexpected is life that within a few months the world …the entire world is taken over and the life of all its people changed… perhaps forever… by a miniscule ‘thing’ whose very existence as a ‘living’ organism is debated. That tiny organism, about 10,000 times smaller than a single grain of salt, has managed to halt traffic… aircraft, trains, massive trucks, trundling containers, everything. It has shut down businesses, some of them run by powerful magnates, ruin livelihoods and impressive economies, and kill more than 300,000 humans around the world, more than nukes managed to kill in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

In a world where humans boast about whose nuclear arsenal is larger and about being able to decimate their enemies by pressing a button, this tiny thing has ‘achieved’ much the same much more insidiously and very efficiently. Unlike clunky human bombs this organism has killed humans alone by means of a disease that has as yet no cure. Structures remain unharmed, houses, buildings and towers stand as before, and there is no damage to forests and wildlife. In fact if anything wildlife has thrived in the absence of man on the streets and with the decrease in the atmospheric pollution he caused.

Never has humanity been more united in distress, nor human beings worked more determinedly towards a common goal, a worthy goal, as they do now when they’re racing to develop a vaccine to combat covid-19, the disease. And never has what is good and what is bad in human society been more starkly differentiated for all to see. The inefficiency, the materialism, the selfishness, the opportunism displayed by a few persons in stark contrast to the selflessness and devotion of the many… doctors, nurses, medical researchers, charities and the such whom the world can never thank enough.

Never have the most crucial problems in society been more thrown into relief, like the important bits in a document being highlighted in fluorescent colours or typed in a bold font to catch the reader’s eye for maximum impact. We see starkly as never before the difference in the suffering of the rich on the one hand and the less fortunate on the other. Perhaps it was needed to put it this way because the difference was always there and was always stark but we had got used to it.

The world has become used to incorporating poverty within it as if it were some kind of necessary ingredient, like leavening in bread or water in coffee. We exist within viewing distance of poverty, we allow it to persist and grow as if nothing can be done about it. We accept without much question the differences that exist in society, in housing, education, nourishment and health care. This is not just in Third World countries, it is also in countries like the USA where homeless persons may be found living in parks in residential areas, where the difference in health care is mindboggling depending on whether you have insurance or not, or in Pakistan the difference between being able to afford a good private hospital or not.

It is inequality that is more or less inevitable, not poverty, the kind that leads to immense disadvantages… that is not necessary at all, and something can be done about it if the will exists.

Now, for the poor, the choice is very much in black and white. For the others there are options. For the poor this episode of covid-19 has been a choice between dying of the virus and dying of want. For the rest it has been an inconvenience, of having to make do without help, of having to disinfect and wash and not being able to socialize. But in the process we have seen the interdependence of one upon the other, how much we need various trades– the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker, and how much they need our custom. It comes home to us that everyone does not have a bank account much less access to online banking, so people don’t get paid while there is a lockdown, or they are not paid because they do not earn. So there is an increase in violence, what a surprise.

Can something be done so that even if there must be a lockdown… and the need will definitely arise again… we can survive it?

If even after this, these issues are not tackled, then the next disaster might come that much closer to annihilating us all. And there will be nobody to blame but ourselves. If we are still alive.

LAST MINUTE PANIC

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/05/10/last-minute-panic/

This episode of covid-19 has yet again highlighted one thing above all others throughout the world, and certainly in Pakistan. It has shown that the poor are the least equipped to enter quarantine, or to deal with a pandemic. They have tiny homes (if they have homes) ill-suited to staying indoors long-term. And they have almost no resources to withstand a break in their ability to earn.

There are some things that can be done to enable the disadvantaged to handle such events a little better.

An issue that has been highlighted is that, as a result of the pandemic, children are even more likely to miss out on their immunization vaccines, something that was already happening as a result of ignorance and misinformation.

Around a third of the children born every year in Pakistan have not had crucial childhood vaccinations by the time they are a year old, even though the initial stage of these vaccinations ought to be completed by the age of 15 months. These vaccines prevent tuberculosis, polio, diphtheria, whooping cough, tetanus, haemophilia, influenza type B, hepatitis B, diarrhoea, pneumonia, and measles. A national daily has quoted Dr D. S. Akram. a pediatrician working with an NGO dealing with immunization and child health, as saying that the largest city Karachi is “seeing a mini epidemic of measles, polio cases are on the rise, and TB is killing more people than Covid-19. All these infections are preventable, and we have vaccines available in Pakistan to combat them,” said Dr Akram.

It is a question of combating the ignorance that leads to this neglect. The government provides these shots free of charge. Yet around 500,000 persons are diagnosed with TB in Pakistan every year. Personnel administering polio drops are assaulted on a regular basis because local wisdom says they are in some way doling out disease rather than preventing it.

When there is a situation such as the current lockdown, even those who wish to get their children vaccinated may be unable to do so. Vaccines are unavailable and it is not easy to access the points where they are administered. Immunisation must be facilitated otherwise while a cure for covid-19 may be found, the world will be inhabited by even more patients of preventable diseases.

Now with people in quarantine, they are under great stress both financial and emotional. This has led to a great increase in domestic violence, but that is not all. Being cooped up together in small homes and being unable to go out into the open is likely to cause an increase in TB which will also increase when people are unable to visit clinics for treatment.

There is also likely to be an increase in the birth rate at this time. More than seven million children are born in Pakistan every year into a population that is already much greater than the country’s resources. In all times, but particularly now, there is an urgent need for better awareness regarding birth control, access to which must be facilitated when people are less able to make it to sale points and clinics, and much less able to afford it.

It is fine to say we need to maintain social distancing, but guidelines for home isolation for example have only just been finalized in the Punjab and presented to the Chief Minister for approval. These guidelines advise that PCR-positive patients and those with mild or no symptoms should be isolated at home rather than in hospitals which are overstretched, and it is advises on the care for such persons.

Aren’t these guidelines a bit overdue? You would think that once the pandemic hit, the first thing that would be done would be to set up a committee that would (aside from drawing a salary) come up with such guidelines. Coordination, organisation and honesty do not seem to be strong points in this country, although there is no reason except for a lack of commitment for this to be the case.

Educational institutions have been shut down to maintain this distancing all over the country. Students enrolled in private schools and colleges are able to attend tutorials online while this is the case. But the great majority of the young people of Pakistan have no access to water and soap, much less computers and Internet facilities. With the chasm between government and private institutions already almost unbridgeable, this hiatus in education has deepened that chasm to formidable depths.

Computers and online facilities are no longer a luxury these days, they are a necessity. If a home does not possess online facilities, and most homes do not, there should be another way for its members, particularly students, to access computers. At times like these when schools are shut down, poor students should not be left behind their more affluent contemporaries.

Lack of education, and the pervasiveness of ignorance, makes everything much worse than it would otherwise be. Most of the people in Pakistan are uneducated. They cannot be blamed if at this time they resort to strange remedies and ignorant methods to combat illness, such as injecting themselves with disinfectant or resorting to chants and other things to drive away the troubles besetting them.

It is time the federal and provincial governments identified these problems and took measures to deal with them rather than quarreling among themselves and being on the backfoot when the need arises.

Pandemics and quarantines have happened before and will happen again. Unless we are committed to the cause we are likely to be caught unprepared every single time.

THE MESSAGE

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/05/02/the-message-2/

Maulana Tariq Jamil’s reading of the message behind covid-19 in which he blamed ‘shameless’ women and as a result of that God’s wrath for covid-19, is sheer nonsense, but that a message has been exposed as a result of this viral episode is unmistakable. That message is that humankind has made a hash of the earth’s environment. Now that covid-19 has taken centre stage, the most positive thing that has occurred is that the earth is getting a chance to recover from the damage caused to it to by us, at least until we humans come out of our homes again, return to our businesses, and go back to causing destruction. Until that happens the skies have cleared, and distant mountains that were cloaked as a result of pollution have become visible again. Best of all, animals that had taken cover from man’s rampant domination of the earth have come out of hiding. In Pakistan mountain lions have been seen. In other countries bears, deer, kangaroos, birds and other wildlife have all come into the open. It should cause us, if it has not already, to hang our heads in shame. So where did we go wrong?

One of the effects of mankind’s unrestrained careless activities on earth has been the production of dangerous levels of greenhouse gases.

Greenhouse gases (water vapour, carbon dioxide CO2, methane CH4, nitrogen oxide NO2 and Ozone 03) are a normal result of decomposition, agriculture etc. But they can reach dangerous proportions if these activity go unchecked by laws and regulations. These gases are produced because of over-industrialistaion, overuse of chemical pesticides, and so on. The gases then produced have harmful effects on the environment, including unbalanced levels of radiation. Just one result of this has been the appearance of ozone holes over the Arctic and the Antarctic. In fact a new ozone hole, the largest ever, opened up very recently over the Arctic.

The ozone holes reached alarming proportion, as did the harmful greenhouse gasses, and these have contributed to higher temperatures and melting glaciers, and higher sea levels. A decade ago the Secretary General of the UN actually warned that the world was “heading towards an abyss,” saying that the higher sea levels would flood cities. He specifically mentioned Pakistan and Karachi, and some other countries, as being at very high risk of flooding, famine, wars and death.

But things have changed, at least temporarily ever since covid-19 took centre stage. Factories have either shut down or brought down their production all over the world. Air travel has almost ceased. There are substantially fewer cars on the roads. And what do you know, the largest ever ozone hole that opened up so recently, has suddenly closed.

According to Dahiya and Butt in the CREA journal, comparing data from before to after lockdown, NO2 pollution in Pakistan has dropped 35 percent in Karachi, 56 percent in the twin cities, 49 percent in Lahore, 20 percent in Multan and 45 percent in Peshawar.

NO2 is responsible for thousands of cases of asthma which would not otherwise exist and is the main factor behind the production of PM2.5, which stands for particulate matter. The greater the particulate matter in the air, the higher the atmospheric pollution. This impacts on lung and heart health and significantly decreases mortality.

Deaths from covid-19 in Pakistan are officially at 417 on Saturday morning. If you believe official figures regarding covid-19 deaths (although they’re almost certainly much more than that) it means that environmental pollution kills many, very many more people in this country than covid does, as it does around the world. So pollution across the world must be controlled once things are back to normal.

China may be the largest industrial nation in the world, but the USA is right behind it at number two.

The election of Donald Trump as leader of the second most industrialised nation has been a huge disaster for many reasons, most certainly for the environment.

The following data has been taken from the National Geographic, from a list of the impact the POTUS has had on the environment.

President Obama had placed restrictions on the dumping of mining waste into waterways. Mr. Trump revoked those restrictions. His fellow Republicans called the restrictions ‘redundant and onerous.’

The Keystone XL pipeline has been approved by the Trump Administration. The previous government had rejected the pipeline amid fears that it would produce much greater carbon emissions.

The Trump Administration has made massive cuts in scientific research and environmental programmes designed to protect air and water.

In 2017 the Trump Administration cancelled laws to prevent endangered whales and turtles from getting snagged in nets on the US West Coast.

The same year the USA pulled out of the crucial Paris Climate Agreement which brings together a group of 194 countries that have agreed to work towards curbing greenhouse gas emissions that lead to global warming.

The US presidential election is a matter concerning the American people, but its impact is felt around the world. If the administration of the second largest industrial nation has no understanding of environmental issues, then it does not bode well for the rest of us. Just as much as if our own government were to fail in that respect, which it too has.

A lot has been written about the subject, but it is astounding how it took a microscopic organism to bring the matter into sharp focus.

SOME STRIKING PARALLELS

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/04/26/some-striking-parallels-2/

• Covid-19 is making us face some uncomfortable questions

Women have often dreamed of an opportunity to put men in their shoes, to see how far they can walk in them. That opportunity it seems is here.

Both men and women have been heard complaining about how uncomfortable it is to wear a mask. “Its hard to breathe,” “It makes me feel hot, suffocated,” and “I can’t wait to take this ruddy thing off my face,” are some of the things being heard.

Well, it is most understandable, so perhaps one could stop for a moment to perceive the parallel between ‘this ruddy thing’ and the face covering that many women are expected to embrace, the covering that Islam does not require but is said to expect women to don. One moreover that does not end with the discovery of a vaccine but carries on till the woman’s last breath.

Yes it is very hard to cover one’s face, particularly when the temperatures go up. It is impossible to believe that Allah, the One we call Rehman and Raheem, would put woman through this torture.

But there is more. Putting a covering over the face reduces peripheral vision which makes it hazardous for a woman in a tent to drive a car and cross the road. And then there is also the fabric wound around the head, no different to wearing a scarf in searing temperatures. A trailing abaya often accompanies all this other gear; it is both unsanitary and once again a torture, particularly in the heat. Both the trailing abaya and scarf are prone to getting snagged in the wheels of a motorbike, making it extremely dangerous and even life threatening for a woman precariously seated on the bike and for the child or children very often in her arms. In fact it should be illegal in this case. But when have the authorities ever been known to stand up to the religious mafia?

In fact, there are many facets to this coronavirus business. This episode will hopefully encourage people to take a closer look at some of the practices so deeply ingrained in our society in the name of religion.

There is of course the fact that the clergy seems to disregard all evidence to the contrary and is insisting on resuming congregational prayers in mosques, expecting worshippers to be somehow protected from infection.

This is nothing but an example of self-interest dictating policy, as for example is happening in the USA with the President suggesting medications in the making of which he holds a financial interest. Where would our poor uneducated mullah get the high that comes with authority without the congregations they head?

It is perhaps natural for a group of persons whose only claim to elevated position is their supposed knowledge of religion to be reluctant to relinquish it. Clerics have long fought against science, because they feel threatened by it, although Islam does not claim any conflict between the two. The Quran in fact repeatedly asks us to observe nature and learn from it.

In the Quran it says: “Have those who disbelieved not considered that the heavens and the Earth were a joined entity, and we separated them and made from water every living thing? Then will they not believe?”

And again: “It is He Who created the night and the day, and the sun and the moon. All (the celestial bodies) swim along, each in its rounded course” (21:33).

“It is not permitted for the sun to catch up to the moon, nor can the night outstrip the day. Each just swims along in its own orbit.”

There are numerous other such examples. So where does the conflict arise?

Why, for example can we not fix our lunar calendar instead of going through the moon-sighting ritual? Perhaps alone among the Muslim world, the people of Pakistan never know when they are expected to start fasting and when they must stop.

This is a democracy. It was a certain set of people that was elected to govern the country. It seems though that that set of people have little say in policy. If they say that congregational prayers will not be held until the threat to the health of the nation is over, congregational prayers should not be held. But that is not the case.

Why?

FAISAL EDHI: DONATING TO THE GOVERNMENT'S COVID FUND

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/04/18/faisal-edhi-donating-government-covid-fund/

There is a process involved in donating money. Most people give tips and the odd few hundred to someone who appears to need it without much thought, but larger sums of money always involve an assessment of whether or not the person genuinely requires it; while donating to an organisation is definitely based on which organisation you trust– and which you don’t.

It is not right therefore if the organisation you donated to because you trusted it passes the money on to another one, because there is a possibility that the donor did not donate to that other one because he did not trust it.

There is a good reason for example why many people did not donate to the damn fund, sorry, the dam fund, remember it? The one that was renamed ‘The Supreme Court of Pakistan and the Prime Minister of Pakistan Diamer-Bhasha and Mohmand Dam Fund,’ when Imran Khan the then newly elected Prime Minister of Pakistan jumped in in 2018 – as he does, into this, yet another example of judicial activism by the former Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar. Those who did not donate to that fund obviously did not consider the Diamer-Bhasha and Mohmand Dam worth supporting. Perhaps they took into account expert opinion, an opinion that was ignored by the authorities and which said that such large dams were actually counter-productive and were not the way to deal with the issue of water shortage. Others did not donate to the fund because they did not trust that the funds would be used as they were meant to be.

On the other hand several people and organisations did donate. Even so, the target of some Rs 1.5 trillion needed for building the dams was never reached and only Rs 9.8 billion were ever collected, which is a tiny fraction of the amount required. And then the Chief Justice sahib said, when questioned about ‘what next,’ that the fund was never meant to be for the dam really, it was only to ‘raise awareness’ of the issue. That response came as an unpleasant surprise for the donors.

Since then the fund has been in limbo, while the good judge has been too busy marrying off his son in a ceremony so lavish it boggles the mind, and makes you wonder, putting two and two together and coming up with much more than four.

It is never a good idea to cover everyone with the same blanket. There will always be exceptions to the rule. But the general rule in Pakistan appears to be that its governments are rarely to be relied upon to function honestly. There has never been a government that was an exception to that rule, not even the one currently in power, seeing that it is composed greatly of people who rolled over and into it from the previous one and the one before that. There have been wheat scandals, and sugar scandals, and questions as to whether the frontispiece is actually the person named or someone else pulling the strings.

Therefore, when Faisal Edhi donated Rs. 10 million to the Prime Minister for the government’s coronavirus relief fund, it was not appreciated by those who donate to Edhi.

Faisal Edhi’s father Abdul Sattar Edhi, helped by his wife Bilquis Edhi, was one of Pakistan’s─ and even the world’s─ greatest philanthropists. People donated to the Edhi Foundation, a non-profit charity organisation, knowing that the money they give was safe and would reach the people it was intended for. Edhi set up the world’s largest fleet of ambulances, homes for the destitute and other things that have benefited millions in this country over the years.

Abdul Sattar Edhi kept his charity organisation to itself with good reason. He helped whoever was in need of a helping hand regardless of the recipient’s religious belief, and was criticized by some so called religious figures for this. He retorted that he did not believe in discrimination. People put obstacles in his way and maligned him, but he never let them deter his good work, determinedly remaining independent because he wanted no strings attached to his work.

Perhaps Faisal Edhi has not understood the reasons behind his father’s refusal to ally with other groups, much less the government. Faisal has said that “if all stakeholders don’t work together and if they maintain gaps, the public will face problems.” He has urged “critics, opposition, the Centre and other parties to forget their difference and stop criticizing each other,” saying that “if we don’t form a consensus then it will benefit the coronavirus, not us.” He is also quoted as saying that “he is full and gratitude and very happy that the Edhi Foundation is working with the government.”

Well he’s very right about cooperation. But there is a difference between ‘working with’ and cooperation, at least in the context that Faisal has used it. Cooperation does not have to be monetary. Everyone, individual and organization, can and should forget their difference and work together towards a common good. The Edhi Foundation could loan out its ambulances where required, it could provide quarantine facilities and food for those infected with the virus and many such things. But money? How do you track where money goes? Take this seriously, because money very often can and does go walking where it shouldn’t. One hopes most ardently that Faisal will come to realise that his father had it right all along, before the Edhi Foundation falls victim to a lack of trust. What a huge pity that would be, given the lifetime of extreme hard work, self-denial and commitment put into the organisation by Abdul Sattar Edhi. May God bless him.

QUALITY ASSURANCE

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/04/11/quality-assurance/

With cases of the novel coronavirus increasing in the country as well as around the world the government of Pakistan is now encouraging the local production of ventilators, sanitisers and a larger quantity of chloroquine. It has also given the go-ahead for clinical trials for plasma therapy if required following infection with the covid-19 corona virus. This is good; it is in fact something that should have been done long ago. Sanitisers and chloroquine are already being made in Pakistan, but it is necessary to keep an eye on their quality if they are in much greater demand.

Making ventilators too is well within the capability of local manufacturers. The cost of a single ventilator is prohibitive, and it makes sense for the government to try and produce them right here in Pakistan, but stringent quality standards must be adhered to and no one, but no one, must be allowed to get away with carelessness.

Locally manufactured products tends not to be made with a care to safety. Ventilators require meticulous manufacturing as well as maintenance, or they can lead to a patient’s death from the treatment rather than the disease.

As for clinical trials, they pose a similar question mark.

Plasma therapy requires a plasma donor and a recipient. The plasma donor must be recently recovered from covid-19, which means he should at the time of donation be confirmed as negative following a positive diagnosis for infection with covid-19. And so that the plasma does not pass on any diseases, the donor must be tested negative for diseases such as HIV, AIDS, Hep-C, syphilis or others. If he or she is free from all of the above, he can then donate blood from which the plasma– the liquid part of the blood- is separated and transfused into a recipient who is currently critically sick with covid-19. The idea is that the antibodies in the plasma of the donor will generate similar antibodies in the recipient.

Clinical trials are a meticulous exercise conducted in several stages, all of which will not apply in this case because plasma therapy is not a new treatment, Still, the effect on recipients of the plasma donation must be painstakingly recorded and studied, also because covid-19 is a new disease, and so therefore is whatever is being used to treat it.

The donor’s blood must be properly screened to prevent diseases being passed on to the recipient. A single mistake can lead to terrible results.

Phase II of a clinical trial involves testing of the drug, transfusion or procedure on patients to assess and record the effectiveness. The process is monitored by the researcher. Any side effects must be noted and recorded.

During transfusion attention must be paid to sanitization, which is not one of our strong points.

Phase III involves much the same with a larger number of patients, and this time also a clinician to oversee the process.

Phase III is a follow-up phase after treatment. Personal physicians are involved in this phase where long-term effects of the treatment, positive and negative are noted and recorded.

Pakistan is not best known for meticulous work. Gross carelessness and even fudging of records and results by medical assistants and even doctors has been experienced even in some of the best hospitals of Lahore. It must be the same in other cities. Even students have been known to be censured when their figures did not meet the data conclusions anticipated by their University. You wonder how much of this is likely to occur during the course of these trials, which stand in danger of not being taken seriously by the international community just because of where they took place.

In Pakistan the Drug Regulatory Authority is in charge of clinical trials. No trial can be carried out without a certificate from this authority which is issued after the scrutiny of an application and the payment of a fee. The proposal must also pass through an ethics committee, and the researchers must possess the specified qualifications and experience.

Unfortunately in Pakistan money changes hands all too frequently to get the desired results. It takes place in every sector, every aspect of national life. In the case of clinical trials and the manufacture of life saving equipment more than any in other, such deplorable practices must not be allowed to happen, or the death or disability of hapless individuals will be on the heads of the authorities, if they care.

WHAT THE MOON SAW

https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/04/05/what-the-moon-saw/

• A look beyond the pandemic

“Tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today.” Malcolm X

“Unless we see the new moon through these, our lowly eyes, neither the joys of Eid nor the mourning of Muharram can proceed.” Mullah in What the Moon Saw.

In 1967 Ghulam Abbas wrote a short story called Dhanak, one of the most remarkably prescient stories ever written. It is translated and included in a selection of Modern Urdu short stories by Amina Azfar. In the English version this story is called What the Moon Saw. In this tale Abbas talks about mullahs becoming increasingly bold in Pakistan, until they view any action by the government as interference in religion. The legitimate government finally becomes unable to move, even to do what was right, and eventually the mullahs take the reins of government into their own hands. Section 144 is imposed, and there is a crisis in the country. Many professions come to an end, and thousands lose their livelihood.

What was shown as likely to happen is eerily similar to what is now happening, a government too afraid to do what it thinks is right, if it has thought at all.

You wonder what, at the end of this worldwide tragedy called COVID-19, the moon will see when it looks down upon this shattered earth. Will it see some people with blood on their hands, among them those who insisted on gatherings and congregations even when quarantine was the need of the hour?

Will the moon see people picking themselves up as if after a battle, dazed, surrounded by shells of homes and stubs of trees? Will it see raiding gangs and ravenous mobs devouring whatever comes their way, something like the Chinese people whom we see fit to blame for this event? Perhaps the Chinese too learnt to eat anything and everything after exactly such a calamity, it is said that that is very possibly the reason.

As for the people, they are now and will be even more so later too caught up in a frenetic cycle of making ends meet and trying to survive, much too caught up to look for ways and means out of the situation.

Will the moon see a massive and inevitable rise in violence and robberies, the only recourse for a desperate people for whom help was announced with much fanfare but when it came to the point it was too complicated to work?

Even if people were to search for a way out, how would they know what there is out there? Would they be able to think of anything other than a roof to sleep under, bread, water and – these days mobile phones? Lacking education and even literacy, they do not possess the advantage provided by books, those extendable poles which look beyond immediate surroundings. The vision books provide might give them something to work towards. Is this why little effort has been made to bring the two together?

If people come together with books they might read in the same anthology Manto’s Jhooti Kahani, all about an ‘association of rogues and criminals,’ fighting for their rights, a satire on the workings of public office.

And these are only a handful of stories. Others can be found on the faces of those who have lost their livelihoods, and now have nothing to eat.

Future generations need us in the present to pave the way for them to understand the challenges they face. We do not need another generation of ‘institutional decay, social anarchy, intellectual degeneration and urban decline.’

When all this is over people need food, yes, and jobs, yes, and the means to survive. But most of all they need to be able to think for themselves. They must no longer be led by the nose to drink at troughs in which the water has been laced with brain-numbing drugs.

The situation is not good, and the government is facing an uphill task. Its fears are legitimate. But just as doctors and nurses all over the world have rolled up their sleeves and carried on working even without proper safeguards, the authorities need to stand up to the hurdles it faces and do what is right, which is what they were elected to do.