ED: Prioritizing the health of the nation

The coronavirus has forced us to drastically change the way we do things, from maintaining social distance to wearing masks, in order to ensure the health and safety of the nation. This has also meant demanding great sacrifice from the people and rethinking what is acceptable in the current climate. 

However, despite the very real risk of a second wave of fresh coronavirus cases which could lead to the nation going into a renewed lockdown and threaten the lives and livelihoods of millions, around 100,000 people attended the namaz-e-janaza of Golam Sarwar Sayeedi, an eminent Islamic scholar.

It is of course natural for us to desire to pay our respects to people we hold in great esteem -- but surely, given the circumstances, such a mass gathering of people could have been avoided in order to ensure that a potential second wave does not devastate our nation’s economy and its people as it has done to many other more affluent countries across the world?

Despite assurances from authorities that health directives were maintained, during such a gathering where the numbers are in the tens of thousands, there is only so much that hand sanitizers and face masks can do, and maintaining social distance is pretty much impossible -- as photos from the janaza clearly show.

This was not the first time that such an event has occurred and we must remain vigilant against them, for they can very well negate all the effort and sacrifices we have made so far for our nation.

Authorities would do well to ensure that such gatherings, which are nothing short of potential clusters of coronavirus that can spread through the nation like wildfire, are prevented in the future and that the health of the nation is always prioritized above all.