THE deadly Coronavirus and its impact are assuming alarming dimensions both in Pakistan and elsewhere in the world with no progress towards development of any authentic vaccine and economic fallout increasing with the passage of each day. Stock markets and oil prices went into free fall Monday as interest rate cuts and fresh stimulus measures by central banks failed to dampen fears amid the global Coronavirus pandemic. In Pakistan too, KSE-100 index saw the worst intra-day decline (6.7%) since the 2008 financial market crash (on 24 June 2008) when the index slipped 7.9pc during the day.
The reaction of the markets was understandable as the virus is spreading fast and in the case of Pakistan the number of infected people tripled in a single day with Sindh reporting 47 new cases, taking the country’s tally to 183. According to Advisor to Sindh Chief Minister on Information Murtaza Wahab the exponential increase is largely due to the recent inflow of pilgrims brought in from Taftan border after a purported quarantine. Same is the case with KP, which also received Iran-returned Zaireen from Taftan, where the number of people infected with the virus is reported to be fifteen. Infectious diseases experts in Karachi claimed that a ‘sizeable number’ of people were affected by the Coronavirus after pilgrims from Iran were allowed to enter without keeping in a proper quarantine by health authorities and that even infected people from the UK, Iraq, Syria and Saudi Arabia were allowed into the country and they spread the disease to those around them.
A study of the infected cases would reveal that all of them acquired virus from abroad and this proves approach of the Government right, which declined to bring back Pakistani students from China despite pressure from relatives and public opinion. Otherwise too, China has successfully cured patients and also took effective measures to check the spread of the disease and now it reports only imported cases of virus. However, unlike China, other countries are not demonstrating the level of responsibility that the virus requires of them, which is evident from the fact that a Chinese citizen in the US who fell ill with Coronavirus was forced to fly to China to be tested after she was denied testing three times at her local hospital at Massachusetts. There are reports that some Chinese people living abroad have been forced to return to the country for Coronavirus testing as foreign governments have failed to implement widespread checks for the virus. China was praised by the World Health Organization for its response to Covid-19 after it introduced strict quarantines and social distancing measures to control the outbreak. Beijing has also expressed its readiness to extend fullest possible cooperation to other countries in dealing with the threat and there is a need for all countries to demonstrate the same level of readiness and commitment. It is also evident that the fast spreading virus cannot be checked merely through local actions by individual countries as mutual interaction cannot be stopped altogether because of interdependencies.
It was in this backdrop and spirit that Pakistan participated in the SAARC video conference on Coronavirus and proposed that a “regional mechanism” be developed by members of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) so that the countries can exchange “disease surveillance data in real time” to curb the spread of viruses such as the COVID-19. The issue should be seen purely from humanitarian angle and all countries provided required assistance to cope with the emergency including Iran, which is one of the worst hit states and is under crippling sanctions that affect its handling of the virus. The country has been scrambling to contain the rapid spread of Coronavirus which so far has infected 13,938 people and killed at least 724 including 12 politicians and officials, both sitting and former, and 13 more have been infected and are either in quarantine or being treated. The resourceful and technologically advanced countries ought to share their resources with others especially developing and poor countries and sanctions should be relaxed, if not lifted altogether, in view of the serious challenge to the entire globe.
