In a fight with the COVID-19: Public Health Perspective

Enamul Hafiz Latifee writes,

The COVID-19 emerged during December 2019 at Wuhan City, Hubei Province of China has infected more than 722,900 people claiming 34,200 lives so far till 29 March 2020 just after causing first death on 11 January 2020, in a very short time, literally within 2 months 18 days only and counting more at every single second, spreading worldwide at an exponential rate. The trace to COVID-19 takes us on 31 December 2019, when ­the World Health Organization (WHO) was alerted to a group of pneumonia patients in China. After one week, on 07 January 2020, the Chinese authority confirmed identifying a new type of Coronavirus that caused pneumonia and named it as 2019‑nCoV. On 11 February 2020, the WHO named it COVID-19 and on 11 March 2020, WHO Director-General, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus characterized COVID-19 as a pandemic as it infected 118,000 cases in 114 countries, and 4,291 people lost their lives till then.

 

Typical shape of Coronavirus. Source: National Geographic

Bangladesh, the world’s 8^th largest populated country with 165.55 million people having a population density of 1,121.50 per square kilometer, officially reported its first three COVID-19 cases on 08 March 2020 by Professor Dr. Meerjady Sabrina Flora, Director, Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research (IEDCR). Since then, IEDCR and other organizations performed the Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) test on 1,076 individuals ranging from 50 to 110 persons daily and found forty-eight COVID-19 positive people among whom 15 had recovered and 5 had died, surprisingly enough, there was no single COVID-19 case had been found on 28 and 29 March 2020, raising a question over the coverage of tests being conducted. However, the print news media of Bangladesh are constantly reporting few more deaths everyday terming them showing COVID-19 like symptoms during their deaths, but these claims are of uncertainty as IEDCR was not able to test their blood samples at many occurrences. Meanwhile, the WHO has classified Bangladesh’s COVID-19 spread as “Locally Transmitted”. Realizing the urgency of preparedness and responding to the pandemic, Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) of Bangladesh has drafted and published 17 Guidelines so far, covering national preparedness, individual-level prevention procedures, home care of COVID-19 mild symptoms showing persons, standard operating procedures for hospitals, patients’ biological and other waste handlings, and many other fundamental aspects. However, it is worrisome to observe that the mortality rate in Bangladesh is 10.42% due to COVID-19 that is terribly higher than any other SAARC Countries, followed by Afghanistan that has COVID-19 mortality rate at 3.33% till today (Table- 1).

On 25 March 2020, while addressing the nation on the occasion of the Independence and National Day, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina made the plea by saying, “We won in 1971 against our enemy by standing shoulder to shoulder. Fighting Coronavirus is also a war and in this war, your responsibility is to stay home. If the Almighty wants, we shall win the war with everyone’s efforts”. Riding on the exact directions provided, Bangladesh should take the WHO’s extensively explained 8 major pillars at its publication “Operational Planning Guidelines To Support Country Preparedness And Response” very seriously (Figure- 1).

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Furthermore, the WHO has segregated these eight major pillars into 3 levels of priority steps and actions, i.e., Basic Level, Developing Level, and Sustainable Level. At the Basic Level, a country is suggested to map current capabilities and establish actions based on pre-existing plans, while, at the Developing Level, a country is recommended to broaden the scope of actions and deploy additional resources, and to be at the Sustainable Level, the country should gain the ability of systematic monitoring and adjusting readiness and response plans as appropriate. Revisiting the immediate steps suggested by the WHO in Operational Planning Guidelines and Bangladesh’s current developments on Coronavirus, the following recommendations are made to sharpen the country’s strategies in this battle with COVID-19.

Testing Facilities to be made available up to the District Level

Along with IEDCR, 3 other organizations- Institute of Public Health (IPH), Dhaka Shishu Hospital (DSH), and Bangladesh Institute of Tropical and Infectious Diseases (BITID) have started testing the blood samples for COVID-19 detection very recently. However, as 3 of the testing facilities are located in Dhaka and 1 in Chittagong, there is a very high possibility that many COVID-19 infected persons may go undetected creating threats further on the entire population. This may also cause failure in harnessing positive results through the declared partial lockdown in the country from 26 March to 04 April 2020, as the existing institutional resources of these 4 organizations may not be enough to offer country-wide testing services more frequently. In such a case, South Korean ready-experience of setting up “Phone Booth” look-like quick COVID-19 examination facilities taking only 7 minutes to perform the whole examination process can be the light of hope for Bangladesh. Addressing this criticality, DGHS can consider seeking the cooperation of Embassy of the Republic of Korea to Bangladesh for setting up this COVID-19 examining Phone Booths here at 64 districts in Bangladesh, the government can also work on transferring the know-how for enabling more human resources for operating these facilities.

Readying the Upazilla level Hospitals with Isolation Units

It has been learned from the “National Preparedness and Response Plan for COVID-19, Bangladesh” that 3 hospitals of Dhaka city- Kurmitola, Kuwait Moitree, and IDH, have been selected for managing the patients in isolation, and around 500 hospitals will be prepared for initial care of the COVID-19 patients with mild illness. However, as the population density of Bangladesh is one of the highest in the world, so the existing central isolation system at the national or district level would not give any edge. In the way of bringing a COVID-19 infected individual from a corner of the country to the centre would create scopes of spreading viruses at many layers of transportations. In addition, all the 500 hospitals should be readied at the quickest pace with Ventilators and sufficient 3 layered Personal Protective Equipments (PPEs) following the practices of China could be made available for frontline Doctors, Nurses, and other Health Workers.

Incentivizing the Manufacturers to make Essentials for preventing the spread of COVID-19

On 27 March 2020, The United States President Donald Trump has ordered General Motors to make ventilators for Coronavirus patients, on the other side, on 20 March 2020, Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau had launched Canada’s Plan to Mobilize Industry to fight COVID-19, that orients new measures directly supporting businesses to rapidly scale up production or retool their manufacturing lines to develop critical health and safety supplies and equipment, including sanitization products, personal protective equipment, diagnostic and testing products, and disease tracking technologies in Canada that will support the battle against Coronavirus. It is praiseworthy that, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has also announced Taka 5,000 crore incentive package for export-oriented businesses that could only be disbursed in the form of wages and salaries for workers and staffs. Similarly, Bangladesh Government may also think of offering stimulus package for mobilizing the manufacturing hubs in making ventilators, face masks and shields, hand gloves, sanitizers, PPEs, testing kits, etc. leaving no scope for scarcity of these essentials that can be seen in the market, home, and hospital.

Strictly monitoring the movement of Quarantined Individuals

Till 29 March 2020, Bangladesh has quarantined 53,442 people among whom 24,959 individuals have already obtained release notes from the authority. But, the news media constantly posted in the last several days that home quarantined people at many places are going free and visiting relatives’ houses, markets, and religious places, crafting increasing threats for localities. Community-level awareness building program has to be launched immediately followed by a strict monitoring system enacted by the local police force to enable quarantine as a proper measure to slow down the spread of COVID-19.

The entire world is now at the stake of uncertainty, and the people of Bangladesh have the common belief that this critical situation will not last long if steps taken by the government are synched with the private sector initiatives, propelled with home-grown technologies, and communicated with the communities at right time­.

Enamul Hafiz Latifee is Deputy Secretary, Dhaka Chamber of Commerce and Industry (DCCI). Can be reached at: ehlatifee@dhakachamber.com. 

Readymade garment industries going green

Thank you The Financial Express for publishing our joint write-up titled "Readymade garment industries going green", today.

Many many thanks and congratulations to Mr. Sajib Hossain, as we plan more to move together, and I believe this is just the beginning of leaving our "joint footprints".

However, dear readers, to know more about "Greenization" that we do call, progress of RMG Industry, and financial plus policy supports that it requires to have--- you may read the entire article at the below link,
http://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/2017/08/06/79126/Readymade-garment-industries-going-green

Thank you all!

~ #EHLatifee

Open Letter to Al-Baghdadi from Muslim Scholars:Get concerned & step against ISIS/ISIL

The points noted out by the all the prominent Muslim scholars around the globe, find here why ISIL/ISIS is completely worth of going against of it & why should we even protest it's activities for must. Don't miss it to read please, indeed it is a real document which proves so much things.

1- It is forbidden in Islam to issue fatwas without all the necessary learning requirements. Even then fatwas must follow Islamic legal theory as defined in the Classical texts. It is also forbidden to cite a portion of a verse from the Qur’an—or part of a verse—to derive a ruling without looking at everything that the Qur’an and Hadith teach related to that matter. In other words, there are strict subjective and objective prerequisites for fatwas, and one cannot ‘cherry-pick’ Qur’anic verses for legal arguments without considering the entire Qur’an and Hadith.

2- It is forbidden in Islam to issue legal rulings about anything without mastery of the Arabic language.

3- It is forbidden in Islam to oversimplify Shari’ah matters and ignore established Islamic sciences.

4- It is permissible in Islam [for scholars] to differ on any matter, except those fundamentals of religion that all Muslims must know.

5- It is forbidden in Islam to ignore the reality of contemporary times when deriving legal rulings.

6- It is forbidden in Islam to kill the innocent.

7- It is forbidden in Islam to kill emissaries, ambassadors, and diplomats; hence it is forbidden to kill journalists and aid workers.

8- Jihad in Islam is defensive war. It is not permissible without the right cause, the right purpose and without the right rules of conduct.

9- It is forbidden in Islam to declare people non-Muslim unless he (or she) openly declares disbelief.

10- It is forbidden in Islam to harm or mistreat—in any way—Christians or any ‘People of the Scripture’.

11- It is obligatory to consider Yazidis as People of the Scripture.

12- The re-introduction of slavery is forbidden in Islam. It was abolished by universal consensus.

13- It is forbidden in Islam to force people to convert.

14- It is forbidden in Islam to deny women their rights.

15- It is forbidden in Islam to deny children their rights.

16- It is forbidden in Islam to enact legal punishments (hudud) without following the correct 
procedures that ensure justice and mercy.

17- It is forbidden in Islam to torture people.

18- It is forbidden in Islam to disfigure the dead.

19- It is forbidden in Islam to attribute evil acts to God.

20- It is forbidden in Islam to destroy the graves and shrines of Prophets and Companions.

21- Armed insurrection is forbidden in Islam for any reason other than clear disbelief by the ruler and not allowing people to pray.

22- It is forbidden in Islam to declare a caliphate without consensus from all Muslims.

23- Loyalty to one’s nation is permissible in Islam.

24- After the death of the Prophet (pbuh), Islam does not require anyone to emigrate anywhere.


Download the Open Letter from here, http://lettertobaghdadi.com/index.php

The Combined (English-Arabic) version is available here, http://www.lettertobaghdadi.com/pdf/Booklet-Combined.pdf

সত্যিকার অর্থে কে মূল্য দেয়, আমাদের ব্যাবহার করা ইলেক্ট্রনিক্স পণ্যের?

বেনজিন একটি বিষের নাম, যা বর্তমানে সকল ইলেক্ট্রনিক্স সামগ্রী তৈরিতে ব্যাবহার করা হয়। বেনিজন বিষক্রিয়ায় আক্রান্ত মানুষ যেমন লিউকমিয়ায় আক্রান্ত হয়, ঠিক একইভাবে খুব তাড়াতাড়ি-ই হয়ে যায়, কাজ করতে অক্ষম, ধীরে ধীরে ঢলে পড়ে মৃত্যুর দিকে।

উন্নত বিশ্বে, বেনজিন ব্যাবহার নিষিদ্ধ হলেও, উন্নয়নশীল দেশগুলোয় ব্যাপকহারে ব্যাবহৃত হচ্ছে এই বেনজিন।

এবং কম মূল্যে আমাদের কাছে সকল ইলেক্ট্রনিক্স পণ্য এনে দিতে, তীব্র প্রতিযোগিতার বাজারে টিকে থাকতে ম্যানুফ্যাকচারিং কোম্পনীগুলো সাপ্লাই চ্যানেল লাইবেলিটিস ভুলে গিয়ে, তাদের ফ্যাক্টরিতে কর্মরত কোটি কোটি শ্রমিককে বাধ্য করে বেনজিন নামের সস্তা অথচ ভয়ংকর এই বিষাক্ত পদার্থকে 
ব্যাবহার করে ইলেক্ট্রনিক্স পণ্য ব্যাবহার করতে।

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10202364675453059&saved

অনেক বেনজিন বিষক্রিয়ায় আক্রান্ত মানুষ, যখন জেনে যায়, সে তার পরিবারের বোঝা হয়ে যাচ্ছে, তার আর এই পৃথিবীতে বেঁচে থাকবার কোনই পথ নেই, তখন সে বেছে নেয় আত্নহত্যার মতো নির্মম পথও।

কর্পোরেট দুনিয়া কখনোই আমাদেরকে এসব দেখাবে না। যখন আমরা এটা জেনেই গেলাম, তখন আমাদের আসলেই উচিত, ব্র্যান্ডগুলোর উপর চাপ প্রয়োগ করা যেন তারা এই বিষাক্ত জিনিস ব্যাবহার না করে আর, কারণ আমরাও এর বিষক্রিয়ার আওতামুক্ত নই।

দাম না হয়, একটু বাড়তেই পারে, কিন্তু, সেটা নিশ্চয়ই মানবিকতা আর নিজেদের জীবনের মূল্যের কাছে কিছুই নয়।

China Hopes to Find Vast Stores of Natural Gas Trapped in Shale Rock

Reuters - A natural gas appraisal well of Sinopec is seen behind a treatment pond of drilling waste in Langzhong county, Sichuan province in this March 2011 photo.

BEIJING — In a remote corner of Sichuan with lush, terraced hillsides, oil exploration teams have been scaling cliffs to lay seismic charges and struggling to move heavy equipment along winding mountain roads.

That is where China hopes to find vast stores of natural gas trapped in shale rock. The U.S. Energy Information Administration has estimated that China’s technically recoverable shale gas resources could be 50 percent bigger than those in the United States, where shale has transformed the energy sector.

Published on April 30, 2013, 8:18 p.m.

That has sparked hopes that unlocking those resources could help meet China’s relentlessly growing energy demand and ease its reliance on heavily polluting coal-fired power plants.

But progress on China’s shale frontier has been slow. About 60 shale exploration wells have been drilled over the past two years, according to the consulting firm IHS CERA, about as many as are drilled in North Dakota every 10 days. And there has been no Chinese shale production.

China’s shale gas deposits may be large, but they are remote, and in most places, there is not enough water to provide for the hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, technique used to create cracks that unlock gas trapped in the rock.

‘Above-the-ground factors’

More important, oil experts say, burrowing through China’s regulatory layers is no small feat. In the United States, independent oil companies bought mineral rights owned by private individuals, then pushed ahead with drilling and production. In China, lumbering state companies dominate the landscape, and mineral rights are owned by the state — although which state bureaucracy is in charge of regulation has been a matter of dispute.

“It’s not about the resource,” said an executive from one international oil company that has considered investing here, speaking on the condition of anonymity to preserve relationships with the Chinese government. “It’s about the above-the-ground factors.” An executive from another international oil company, also speaking on the condition of anonymity, called the Chinese National Energy Administration’s goal of producing 230 billion cubic feet of shale gas a year by 2015 and 3.5 trillion cubic feet a year by 2020 “absolute fantasy.”

“There's a lot of fantasy right now about the speed at which shale in China will scale. Almost none of the factors that allowed for ready expansion of shale in the U.S. are present in China — except, perhaps, the geology,” David Victor, director of the University of California at San Diego’s international law and regulation program, said in an e-mail. “It is the ‘above ground’ factors that matter often much more than geological factors below ground.”

China has never been a major natural gas producer or consumer. Natural gas provides just 4 percent of China’s total energy, compared with more than 25 percent in the United States according to the Energy Information Administration.

Much of that gas is supplied to major cities such as Beijing, where it helps ease pollution by burning more cleanly than coal. With rapid urbanization expected to last another decade or more, demand for natural gas is heading higher.

“With accelerating urbanization, per capita energy demand will skyrocket in line with rising income,” Han Wenke and Yang Yufeng of China’s Energy Research Institute wrote in a recent paper. “The energy consumption mix for living will shift from low-end or primary energy (such as firewood in rural areas) to high quality energy (such as pipeline natural gas in cities).”

Bigger role for natural gas

China’s 12th five-year plan aims to boost natural gas to 8 percent of national energy use by 2015.

To get there, China plans a jump in imports as well as tapping domestic supplies of shale gas and coal-bed methane. It already imports liquefied natural gas from exporters such as Qatar, often paying steep prices linked to international oil prices. More LNG is on the way as projects in Australia and Southeast Asia expand. Less likely: imports from Russia. China has haggled with Moscow for years about possible gas pipelines from Russia. On a recent visit to Washington, Russia’s energy minister reported that the two countries were $2 to $3 per thousand cubic feet apart on prices.

Gas imports covered 5 percent of domestic needs in 2007; they account for 30 percent now, according to Zhou Xizhou, director of the consulting firm IHS CERA (China). Domestic production doubled during that time but didn’t keep pace with soaring demand.

China’s national oil companies have looked to the United States to learn the shale business. Sinopec paid $1 billion for properties owned by Chesapeake Energy. Earlier, CNOOC paid billions for a one-third interest in Chesapeake acreage. The Oklahoma-based firm was the leading U.S. shale gas company — until heavy debt and low gas prices battered its fortunes. In January, another Chinese company, Sinochem, spent $1.7 billion to buy a stake in a Texas shale field owned by Pioneer Natural Resources.

Those investments didn’t buy technology transfer, and Chinese companies still need U.S. know-how, despite a U.S.-China Shale Gas Resource Initiative in which the U.S. government tries to promote shale development in China, focusing on resource assessment and technology exchange.

Regulatory spat

Persuading global oil and gas companies to partner or invest here is a challenge that illustrates some of the difficulties of doing business in modern China — and the uncertainties inherent in the oil and gas business.

A spat between two Chinese government bureaucracies muddled lines of authority. The National Development and Reform Commission, an arm of the powerful State Council, oversees oil and gas and other major economic issues. But the Ministry of Land and Resources oversees mineral resources and has claimed jurisdiction, arguing that shale is a mineral.

Royal Dutch Shell, the only company with a production-sharing agreement, signed its deal with PetroChina, an arm of the state-owned China National Petroleum Corp., in March 2012, and it is drilling its third well now, industry sources said. Dozens more will be needed to assess the area’s production potential.

Chevron, meanwhile, is operating in an advisory capacity while Sinopec’s people do the drilling and data collection. Both companies have successful production-sharing deals in Sichuan for what is known as tight gas, also difficult to extract.

Other companies are waiting until the regulatory line of authority is clarified.

For now, the Ministry of Land and Resources has the lead role. It has held two lease sales. The first round went to the two national oil companies, CNPC and Sinopec. In the second, however, not one of the winning bidders has any experience in the risky oil and gas exploration business. They included five electric utilities, five mining firms, an energy trading company and a city gas distributor. Only one of the companies is private.

Foreign companies, which were not allowed to participate, must now cut deals with these Chinese firms if they want access.

Pipeline infrastructure could present a bottleneck, too. The United States is crisscrossed with pipelines. In Pennsylvania, Texas and Louisiana, new shale gas production goes into a network developed over decades. China’s network is far less extensive.

That creates a chicken-and-egg problem, said one international oil executive. The Chinese pipeline company doesn’t want to build a new pipeline without knowing whether there will be enough gas to justify it. The oil and gas exploration company can’t know that without drilling pilot wells, and before doing that, it wants a pipeline.

If companies move ahead, constructing drilling pads is also going to mean moving people, and many Chinese communities have been speaking out more than they did when hundreds of thousands were displaced by the Three Gorges dam project. “The habits of the past, when you could just bulldoze a village, are over,” said one oil executive.

Natural obstacles

Then there are natural obstacles, including the question of whether China’s shale is as rich as initial estimates, which were based on very little data. The organic material left behind millions of years ago has to have been subjected to the right amount of heat and pressure to be turned into methane. If the rock is too soft, hydraulic fracturing might not work so well.

U.S. shale deposits are mostly marine deposits. Five of China’s seven shale basins are lacustrine, derived from lakes. Marine deposits are usually better sources of oil and gas, but there’s no hard and fast rule.

The Sichuan Basin, a marine basin, is believed to hold about a third of China’s shale gas resources, but extensive geological folding and fault lines could make it complex. Other gas reserves in the area have been high in hydrogen sulfide, a poisonous and explosive gas. A 2003 CNPC explosion linked to sulfur dioxide killed more than 240 people.

The Tarim Basin in Xinjiang is believed to be slightly bigger. But it has nowhere near adequate water supplies for fracking.

“Most of China’s areas are facing water challenges, either shortages or pollution,” said Ma Jun, director of Beijing’s Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs. “We don’t want this issue to be further exacerbated.” The Tarim River, he notes, used to drain into a large inland lake, which dried up completely in the 1960s. Large parts of the river, also used to irrigate cotton fields, have run dry too.

Despite the obstacles, most oil experts and industry executives believe China will eventually tap its shale gas resources, even if it takes longer than planned.

“There is every reason for the government to develop more shale resources,” said Zhou, of IHS CERA. But, he added, “the more we look at it, the more unique we realize North America is.”

News Link: China struggles to tap its shale gas

What am I, actually?

Schizophrenic

If you are too Slow to do any work,
You are called Lazy.
If you are too Fast,
Then you are called Crazy.

If your Imagination eyes not so far,
You are known as Dull.
If your Creativity knows no bound,
You are absolutely renown as Schizophrenic.

Man, what to do at next?
I am really afraid of!
Are we really at an Absolute Equilibrium?


© Enamul Hafiz Latifee
e- mail: enamul.hafiz.sust@gmail.com