How to lock down (1).

Byline: Dr Muhammad Zahid - Peshawar

THE provinces have expressed their reservations about the lockdown. This looks the government is pondering easing the lockdown throughout the country after having failed to reach a consensus among all the stakeholders regarding one effective approach.

It is foolish to think one approach can be effective for a province, leave alone the whole country. We are hearing a lot about a 'smart lockdown', but whatever we have in Pakistan is far from it. In fact, it is a mockery of the smart lockdown.

The current situation merits a really smart approach for the smart implementation of the smart lockdown. I would suggest to the government that each district of a province should be categorised into three separate entities depending on the prevalence of Covid-19. They can be red, yellow or green.

We will take Khyber Pakhtunkhwa as a model to understand my point. In KP, the districts where Covid-19 has wreaked havoc are Peshawar, Mardan, Swat, Buner, Dir and Malakand. They should be declared red districts and here the lockdown should be further enhanced instead of being eased out. Definitely it will cause some economic and social issues in these areas but we can't eradicate this menace without taking such drastic measures.

All government machinery should be employed to effectively counter these problems in the red districts. This includes enhancing the capacity of all hospitals there, a strict implementation of lockdown and contingency plans for the public.

Then there are districts where coronavirus spread is moderate like Manshera, Abbottabad, Kohat, Bannu, etc. They should be declared yellow districts. Here the lockdown can be partially eased but with stringent standard operating...