COVID-19 And Pakistan – OpEd

 It was November 17, 2019, when the first coronavirus patient AKA patient “Zero” was diagnosed in Wuhan hospital China, since then the word COVD-19, AKA Corona has become the word of terror. Initially, the world halted its trade with China and China being the major supplier of the world had to shut down all of its production. From Patient Zero to almost 80,000 patients China has suffered throughout. The entire international media was after China and it seems like the entire world started a boycott with China. I remember our discussion within my acquaintances almost everyone was making statements which can be categorized into:

• America is after China to destroy China’s economy with the help of international media ( The so-called Economists)
• They eat all sorts of animals like Bats, Cats Snakes, etc. (the Religious Block)

Needless to say within 4 months the virus has spread over 203 countries and territories around the world and 2 international conveyances: the Diamond Princess Cruise ship harbored in Yokohama, Japan, and Holland America’s MS Zaandam cruise ship. So be it land or sea the virus is everywhere. Total cases in Iran are almost half of China’s but they do not eat bats, rats, snakes, etc., and if America was after Iran and China both then the cases in America alone are more than 103,000 registered patients. In the month of March, the same acquaintance is talking about something different that China has created the virus why? Because China has fully controlled the virus spread within China and also because they purchased 30% – 40% shared of EU companies. Now China will benefit in the longer run. 

Let’s examine what happened in China.

• How: How they controlled the virus?
• Why not: Why not take benefit of the current slump in stocks.

How they have controlled the virus?

We all know that China implemented a complete lockdown within its cities to control the virus spread but the question is:

• Does complete lockdown serve the purpose if so how?
• What China did during the lockdown?

China is a nation with the most advance and sophisticated technology implemented within its country. Chinese use big data analytics combines with Artificial Intelligence to forecast and monitor most of their operations. The COVID – 19 started spreading. China halted its operations and started analyzing the trends through big data analytics.

Most of the Chinese use We Chat Pay for their purchasing and groceries in stores. This application is linked with banking wallets enabling them to use funds from banks. So let’s say a person “A” who was diagnosed with COVID-19 on 1st February 2020, his transactions were analyzed for the last 2 weeks. The roads he/she used people he/she interacted with etc.

Based on these analyses the system identified and flagged people in three color codes. The interesting part is every individual was informed through an application about their rights and rating:

Flag	Description	Action
Red	Patient who is diagnosed with COVID – 19 and his/her immediate family members	Complete isolation and treatment, family members to be quarantined.
Yellow	A person who had an interaction with infected person or his/her family member.	Quarantined and not allowed for driving only basic groceries shopping
Green	The one who never had any interaction or his family members with infected ones.	Allowed to go out only for groceries and drive only if required.

One person from every household was allowed to go out of their houses once in 3 days that too only for basic groceries only if they have green/ yellow rating. Now when they knew who to focus and the entire virus spread is structured and once something is structured it is easy to control.

Why not: Why not take benefit of the current slump in stocks:

Once China has made it structured and started deputing the right people at the right jobs, the entire world started to suffer from the same. The economy started falling and the world does not know what to do but China knows. China started extending help to send doctors and in the meantime, the thinking heads started focusing on how to make the Chinese economy strong. They started investing and buying shares. Why wouldn’t they?

If you want to see who will benefit from any situation you monitor the past and future economic transactions remember the 911 incident the owner of the world trade center insured his buildings a few weeks before the incident happened. Right after the pandemic situation China invested but who invested before the spread?

China started investing in the world’s economy and resulting in having 30% – 40% of shares for a few EU companies. This will benefit China in the longer run. China, Russia, and Pakistan have already started working on building an alliance. The future is not far when the new economic giants will emerge into the world’s economy with their own currency.

COVID-19 in our society:

Now let’s come down to our society, we do not have such an organized system. Well, we have tried to implement a portion of it into the capital of Pakistan. Project Safe Islamabad during which street and road cameras were installed. One of my friends shared a story a few moments ago about a camera that was installed next to an intelligence agency office to detect concealed weapons. One fine evening a car smashed into the pole where the camera was installed and brought it to ground. Police came stayed there for 3 hours they have also called a special team to check the camera. That team took away the camera and waited till the pole is fixed but it was never fixed. A few weeks later there was no camera no pole either. 

“It’s not who we are underneath, but what we do that defines us.” -Rachel Dawes

Now ask yourself how we are going the control the situation:

• By asking our people to stay at home who come outside to see if people are staying at home?
• By locking down an entire area with force as India did and then apologized?
• By putting the blame in Zairains of Iran?
• By putting blame on Tablighi Jamat?
• By doing what Hindu’s did, Azan at 10 o clock at night (Not a single reference in Islam of such practice)?
• By creating a shortage of basic necessities?
• By making sanitizers at home and selling them at higher prices to make a profit?

Or simply by following what was told in our religion submission to the Almighty Allah (SWT). Repent on what we have done in the past and seek Allah (SWT) forgiveness. We have a choice, we have to make the right choice we have nothing but belief as Holy Prophet (PBHU) said:

The Prophet said, there is no disease that Allah has created, except that He also has created its treatment. — SAHIH BUKHARI HADITH NO. 5678 (Book of Medicine)

*Jilani Malik is a motivational speakers and corporate trainer, currently serving in banking field as Assistant Voice President Learning & Development. He has more than a decade of experience a trainer and content development and has served in telecom, hospitality, customer services, sales industry and  Pakistan Air Force.