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At some point in life, we have all been told to be ourselves. But that’s a misleading advice. Mostly, we confuse it with being selfish. There is a fine line differentiating them, and it is easy to mistake one for the other. It’s like two similar-looking buttons placed together on the mental switchboard. By choosing one over the other, we set ourselves in two totally different states of mind.

In fact, we often take the advice of being ourselves as a freedom to let our ego play. We try to ‘be ourselves’ by speaking up whatever our egotistic mind tells us to say, and do whatever it tells us to do. We speak things even if it hurts others, and do things even if it harms others. Only our thoughts, feelings and emotions matter. Everyone should comply with what we think is right.

We put ourselves at the center of the universe and magnify our selfish selves out of proportion. Not others, but ‘I’ need to feel good, be happy, grow rich, have fun. In most of our engagements with the world, this thought become central. And that creates problems—a whole lot of them. There are over seven and half billion people in the world. As everybody is prone to think that way, there are about seven and half billion centers of universe in this planet alone. No surprise that we have so much conflict.

In true sense, to be ourselves is not to be at all. When we try ‘to be’, our habitual tendencies compel us to do selfish things. Being fearless becomes being arrogant, speaking up your mind becomes being rude, being goal-oriented becomes being self-obsessed, and being ambitious becomes being inconsiderate. Even being humble becomes a means of gratifying our sense of greatness and bragging about our own humility. ‘I’ am better than ‘others’.

When we are ourselves, the self shouldn’t be there, or it will be selfish. It entails letting one’s ‘self’ dissolve into just ‘being’. It means being in harmony with others, the nature, entire humanity, entire existence. Let’s not forget that others are pretty much part of the existence as we are. So any separation of ‘I’ from ‘others’ will be a separation from the existence. When we think in terms of I—my life, my likes, my choice, my freedom—we are in disharmony. We are colliding with billions of centers of the universe. That is not very helpful.

So how do we identify the right button and be in the right frame of mind? Maybe we can give it a thought during the coronavirus lockdown.

There are some seeds in my body. 
Gradually growing.

One lies in my heart.
Maturing to love.

One lies in my head.
Maturing to learn.

The other two lie in my hands.
Maturing to help.

Perhaps these lines sum up the attitude of any teenager. But Prashasti Aryal’s prose is special. She is sharp. She is insightful. She contemplates the moon from her study table at nights when everybody else sleeps. And she talks to it. And words flow down to her. Sometimes the moon changes color and becomes red.

Red Moon is a collection of Prashasti’s thoughts and sentiments expressed in poems. But poems don’t tell you what prompted those musings. You can only guess. If you know the person, you can guess better. Sometimes the seed of that emotion has been sown years—or decades—ago. So you need to know the person for long.

But what if you have a book of poems in your hands and you don’t know the person? Learn about the poet’s life first? Not always possible. Perhaps the best way is to empty your mind, and read the poems with as much concentration and openness as possible. Contemplate without straining yourself. What they reveal to you is your understanding of poetry. It gives you a chance to reflect on the feelings or emotions they generate, and to connect you with your own past or imagined experience.

But we aren’t satisfied with that. We still want to know the person who wrote it. Our poet, Prashasti, is a 17-year-old science student who has just finished her higher secondary. Her hobbies are writing, reading, painting, music—all the creative stuff. And she has never been in a relationship. Perhaps that gives the reader some context. One’s age and gender often determine how the mind works.

Biological, social, and peer factors shape thoughts. Prashasti wrote the poems during her 10^th and 11^th grades—a phase of life when things seem to be in a constant flux. She lets her mind wander to discover the sublime. And she wanders with thoughts that are as powerful as swords.

Prashasti’s age can be deceptive. You can’t tell her poems apart from any old hand in the craft. They are rich. They are expressive. But they are also mostly sad and melancholic. Prashasti acknowledges that she is a pessimist and an introvert. In the back cover, she tells the readers that the book is a “piece of my darkness,” and in the introductory note, she cautions her readers that they are about to get into her dangerous mind. But that, too, is deceptive. In the poems, a subtle, beautiful, and mature mind reveals itself.

The poems are diverse. Some are long, some short. Some tell stories, some are just quotes. Some are fit for textbook poetry, some are random thoughts spread out one word per line. They are arranged into four groups, each preceded by a letter Prashasti has written to ‘life’. These are letters of despair and confusion. She tells life that she is “curled up in a corner crying and scared,” and that she is “confused and insecure.” But she endures. And ‘life’ listens. It says it loves her silently, and tells her it is with her always: in the moonlight, in the stars. It reminds her that she was born to fight, and that the difficult phases shall pass. She lets the flux pass through her poems.

‘Life’ tells her to confide in someone. And she does so: in her moon. It knows about her, like no one else does. It meets her in the night when loneliness prevails. And she wonders: How can the moon be so bright even amidst all the darkness?

Red moon
Prashasti Aryal
Genre: Poetry
Published: 2020
Publisher: Sangri-La Books
Language: English
Pages: 159
Price: Rs 295

Silence is powerful. It saves you from lies. But more importantly, it takes you to the truth.

By silence, I mean not merely refraining from talking. It is something deeper. It is allowing your mind to settle down and freeing it from worldly noise. Words are often carriers of that noise. In silence, externally there is an absence of talk and internally there is calm of mind.

Of course we need words to live our everyday lives. We need to talk in some way. But that is only for the sake of convenience.

Reality is almost always distorted when we try to express it in words. If you say ice-cream is sweet, some truth of the ice-cream’s taste is lost already. For me it may be sweet like chocolate, for my mother it may be sweet like honey, and for a farmer in Sarlahi it may be sweet like the sugarcane he grows. For a nomadic Raute of Jajarkot, it will just be some incomprehensible sound.
The truth of ice-cream’s taste can never be fully told in words. It has to be tasted.

Likewise, every reality that we talk about can only be partially expressed in words. To understand it properly, we have to experience it in the depths of our minds. Words have no place there. The same applies to this piece of writing. It can only partially point to a tiny aspect of truth.
We can try using qualifiers. To make people understand what sweet means, we may say ‘sweet like the toffee you had yesterday’. But again there is a problem. If I had a sour mood yesterday, the ice-cream’s sweetness would be ‘unpleasant’ for me. If I was suffering from mouth ulcers and couldn't properly taste the toffee, then the ice-cream’s sweetness would be ‘dull’.

So the best way to tell the truth about the ice-cream is to let people taste it! But we still need to use words; they can at least give people some idea about reality.
Enlightened masters have always used silence to tell the truth about things deep and profound. Ramana Maharshi was famous for his silence. He answered people’s questions without speaking a word. People would just sit in front of him with a hundred questions in their brains. After a while they would get their answers. There was no utterance of words. There are many instances when people went to the Buddha with questions, and they got answers when the Buddha just meditated in silence.

At their best, words may be imperfect pointers to the truth. Isn’t it a good idea that we take them for what they are worth?

Covid-19 has sent over a third of the world population under some type of lockdown. It’s a global pandemic already. And common sense tells us it will soon be a major global stressor. Don’t believe me?

Try a simple Google search about coping with coronavirus, and you will find hundreds of results about anxiety, fear, depression, and mental health. Many of them lead to suggestions for doing some physical exercise, eating healthy, practicing meditation and compassion, and keeping a positive attitude, to stay fit during these stressful times.

On a 9-point advice to its personnel to maintain wellbeing during Covid-19 scare, the United Nations recommends keeping things in perspective and practicing mindfulness. “A good antidote to adversity is kindness and compassion,” it says. For stress-reduction, it advises to “set aside time for relaxation,” and do “spiritual practice, if any.”

Body-mind connect

Physical health very much depends on a healthy mind, and vice-versa. One cannot separate them. As the World Health Organization puts it, “Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” In Eastern spiritual systems, the second factor—mental wellbeing—precedes everything else. Dhammapada, a basic Buddhist text, starts with the verse: “All that we perceive are preceded by the mind; they have mind as their chief; they are mind-made.”

Mayo Clinic, a leading American health non-profit, says mental illness results in complications like weakened immune system, heart disease, and other medical conditions. It means a growing anxiety will lead to weakened immunity. Evidently, nobody would like that at a time of a pandemic.

The science behind it

Famed American neuro scientist Richard Davidson says the practices of mindfulness and loving-kindness influence our minds, brains, and bodies in ways that promote mental wellbeing as well as physical health. “Meditating for mental wellbeing can be similar to a routine job that we do for our physical wellbeing. We take care of our minds as part of personal mental hygiene, just as we all brush our teeth every day,” Davidson had told me some time ago.

Davidson, who has found through laboratory research that mediation can slow ageing, says: “When it comes to physical health, there is more good news: small improvements in the molecular markers of cellular aging seem to emerge with just thirty hours of the practice of mindfulness and loving-kindness.” But the practice, nevertheless, needs to be sustained for tangible results.

Davidson has studied the brains of meditators extensively to understand the effects of meditation on personal wellbeing. In Altered Traits, a book he co-authored with Daniel Goleman, he refers to studies on the application of meditation methods to treat patients with mental health problems. “The findings show that meditation can lead to decreases in depression [particularly severe depression], anxiety, and pain—about as much as medications but with no side effects.”

‘Let go’ but don’t give up

“Due to the coronavirus, everybody has a lot of fear, panic, and anxiety,” says Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, a noted meditation teacher and Buddhist master. “But the most important thing is our mindset and how we think about this. This virus is breaking out around the world, and many people are having many problems and difficulties,” Rinpoche adds. “We must accept the situation and ‘let go’. But we never give up.”

Likening our lives to the waves of the ocean, Rinpoche says we can gain a lot of insight from the ups and downs that exist not only in our lives but in the society and the world.

“We can grow a lot. The important thing is not to give up. If we give up, we cannot learn, we cannot grow, we cannot find a solution, and we do not know what to do. Rinpoche advises people to follow expert advice on healthcare. “You need to maintain hygiene. Wash hands. Take enough rest. Doing physical exercise is very important,” he says. “Be carefree, not careless. Follow the advice.”

“And meditation is really important. You can do the simple exercise of watching your breath or your bodily sensations. When in worry, this awareness is quite good. Sometimes it seems to get worse, but actually it will be getting better.”

“We all have great potential. Everybody has wisdom, love and compassion, awareness, and skills,” Rinpoche adds. “Try making best use of these.”

Meditating via Google Hangouts

Most yoga and meditation classes in Kathmandu closed after Covid-19 became a pandemic. But the students of Mingyur Rinpoche in Nepal have found a new way to keep meditation going even during the lockdown. Fionnuala Shenpen, a meditation facilitator based in Kathmandu, has started hosting meditation sessions using Google Hangouts after the lockdown was imposed on March 24. Shenpen is associated with Tergar International, a global organization that follows Mingyur Rinpoche’s teachings.

“We are limited to our homes, so we’re all on sort of home retreat now,” says Shenpen. She says it is the perfect time to work on one’s meditation practice, adding that it can really help if one is feeling anxious. “As we cannot meet in person, connecting online with others is a great way to alleviate our sense of isolation without breaking the self-isolation rules,” she tells APEX. “It’s so nice to meet everyone without any risk!”

Rashmi KC, a World Bank consultant and a coordinator of Tergar meditation group in Kupondole, has also moved her group online. She too is using Google Hangouts to lead sessions along with Shenpen.

“Our participants have welcomed it as an opportunity to be aware under difficult circumstances. They have told me that it helps them expand awareness into their daily lives, like while they are working in the kitchen.”

“I think we need it more than at any other time. For me, continuation of practice in this crisis is important,” KC adds. “These tough times remind that life is uncertain and we need to learn to embrace it in all its manifestations.”

Spiritual deepening

A major trigger of stress is uncertainty about the future. Things may change not the way we like. The problem lies not in the change itself, but our skewed views about the change. According to Buddhist teachings, ignorance about constantly changing nature of things is a major human stressor. Things keep changing whether we want them to change or not. When they change not the way we want, we feel suffering, we feel unhappy, says Venerable Burin Thitakusalo, executive director of The Middle Way Meditation Institute, a New York-based global non-profit organization.

“Now the world is suffering due to coronavirus, which is a big change from the normal times. But this is not the first time humanity is facing the inevitable change and pain. And we must choose to learn something from this pain, not only suffer from it,” he says while talking to APEX.

But how not to suffer when the world is facing its worst crisis in recent history? How to find that mental calm? “We need to practice mindfulness to let go of grief and sorrow caused by changes,” advises Thitakusalo. Mindfulness makes our minds clearer and brighter, and once that happens, we will find peace and wisdom to respond to the coronavirus crisis, he adds.

Of course we need to find ways to make things better, not worse. Referring to the old saying ‘pain is inevitable, suffering is optional’, the Thai monk and meditation teacher offers guidance: “This is the time the whole world has slowed down. Maybe it is a good to practice spiritual deepening in this time of social distancing.”

“In the end, we might become wiser and stronger to face any future challenge,”Thitakusalo concludes.

Nepalis are unused to online shopping as card or online payment is still a cumbersome process for many of us. But shopping online seems to be the only safe option as the country finds itself under the grip of Covid-19 pandemic.

Supply of daily essentials has been a major national concern after the country went into a lockdown on March 24. The Ministry of Supplies called an emergency meeting of the business community on March 25 to discuss ways to ensure supplies.

“We felt in the meeting that the government is serious about ensuring supplies,” says Amun Thapa, CEO of Sastodeal.com, a prominent e-commerce business in Nepal. “The situation is going to be more difficult in the days ahead. At least two million people live in the capital, and we have to make sure they get their rations.” Thapa says he is more worried about places outside Kathmandu that are beyond the reach of online platforms.

Just before the lockdown, Sastodeal and Daraz Nepal, another e-commerce platform, had seen an increased traffic to their sites and got more orders. “We saw a strong increase in demand and search queries for groceries, as well as for products related to the prevention and possible treatment of the Covid-19 virus,” says Lino Ahlering, managing director of Daraz Nepal.

“Page visits and orders had almost doubled in the week prior to the lockdown on March 24,” says Sastodeal’s Thapa. “But after the lockdown, we are trying to figure how to resume our business.” On its landing page, Sastodeal says deliveries will be made only after the lockdown is over. Likewise, Daraz has asked customers to expect delay in delivery if they have already placed an order.

At the moment, Daraz has been limited to selling digital goods such as mobile, Netflix, and Google Play top-ups, which do not require physical delivery. “Two weeks prior to the lockdown, Daraz also saw a sudden increase in orders,” says Natasha Baidya, Daraz’s marketing manager. “Some sellers wanted to increase prices and unduly profit, but we quickly delisted them.”

For Sastodeal, the system automatically detects and prevents price hikes of over 10-20 percent. “We have a content monitoring team to check both the prices and the quality of products,” says Thapa.

Is the delivery safe?

Former Foreign Secretary Madhu Raman Acharya recently tweeted about purchasing rice from an online store. And there were concerns about viral contamination.

“That delivery guy might have touched thousands of viruses on the way,” commented ‘Bibek Writes’ on Acharya’s tweet. Acharya was also concerned about the safety protocol during physical delivery of the items purchased online.

“When we buy online, we don’t have to go to the market. That way, we can help stop the virus spread,” says Acharya. “But the delivery people of online sellers take cash on delivery, which is risky. And we don’t know if they have followed required safety measures.”

Daraz says there is no need to worry. “We have taken a number of precautions,” says Ahlering. “Before the lockdown, we had an increased hygienic standards for our employees, sellers, and customers. For instance, we offered hand sanitizers to our customers at the time of delivery.”

Need for online payment

Cash on delivery is the biggest safety loophole. There are a few digital wallets and online payment portals that people have started using, but they are far from the reach of the majority. eSewa is the biggest and most popular option right now. Khalti, IME Pay, and other platforms are also coming up.

“Our customers can pay through eSewa, which they find most convenient,” says Sastodeal’s Thapa. “After the Covid-19 pandemic, we have stopped requiring customers to sign or touch any device when they get their orders.” But the cash on delivery option is still there, nevertheless.

“The way to reduce cash transaction is to promote online payments,” says Madhu Raman Acharya. “We can do that by, say, giving 10 percent discount on the use of online apps or wallets. That will reduce cash transactions, and help track legal transactions.”

Daraz’s Baidya says the platform is encouraging online instead of cash payment. “Although we don’t collaborate with online wallets such as eSewa or khalti, customers can pay through their mobile and online banks”

As the world reels under the spell of a deadly virus, I reread Dan Brown’s 2013 bestseller, ‘Inferno’. Brown has this uncanny ability to weave fiction around facts, both historical and contemporary. 

In Inferno, Brown gives us a virtual tour of Florence, a city that lies at the center of the novel's plot. Right now, the crowded monuments, museums, streets and gardens of Florence that Brown talks about in his novel have been deserted, or haunted rather, by the novel coronavirus.  

Bertrand Zobrist is a top genetic scientist worried by the global overpopulation. He wants to find a way to keep it in size, and discusses it with the World Health Organization chief Elizabeth Sinskey. The WHO boss agrees that the rate of global population growth needs to be checked. But she is not convinced by Zobrist’s argument that no less than the planet’s fate is on the line. So the billionaire scientist decides to deploy his own resources to do something about it, and hires a secretive group, The Consortium, to hide him from the world for a year.

As the suspense builds, Zobrist seems to be developing a deadly airborne virus that would infect everybody on the planet within a week. By setting the plot in Florence, the hometown of great medieval poet Dante Alighieri, and drawing on Divine Comedy’s first chapter, Inferno, Brown expertly leads readers into an impending gloom. Enter the Black Death and the beaked masks that doctors wore in the 14th century when a third of Europe died of plague. It is likely that the virus being developed by the scientist, a death doctor of sorts, will cut world population to four billion.

In a stirring one-on-one with the WHO chief, the green-eyed transhumanist-scientist talks of the perils of overpopulation: “Those who have never considered stealing will become thieves to feed their families. Those who have never considered killing will kill to provide for their young. All of Dante’s deadly sins—greed, gluttony, treachery, murder, and the rest—will begin percolating … rising up to the surface of humanity, amplified by our evaporating comforts. We are facing a battle for the very soul of man.”

Deriding the WHO efforts to contain population by handing out free condoms in Africa, which end up in “landfills overflowing with unused condoms,” the scientist says measures like it is only causing more environmental problems. He brings up Machiavelli who talked of plagues as the world’s natural way of self-purging.

The protagonist Robert Langdon—the celebrated Harvard professor of art and symbology—then embarks on a scavenger-hunt from Florence to Venice to Istanbul to stop Zobrist from spreading the virus. Accompanying him is Sienna Brooks, Zobrist's former lover-disciple and a brilliant doctor—and a traumatized child prodigy. Readers are constantly at the edge of their seats as they go through the compulsive page-turner. 

Creative people can look into the future. Brown didn’t have the slightest idea that a deadly viral pandemic would strike the globe seven years after he wrote the novel. But he had some imagination. 

Donald Trump has termed the Covid-19 ‘Chinese virus’. I don’t mind if he calls it a Nepali virus or a lunar virus. But he will not do that, because his voters are not anti-lunatic, they are just anti-Chinese. I can only pray the Chinese virus will respect international borders and let President Almighty live happily within his shielded and secluded America.

But the virus will disappoint us, for sure. It does not know borders, because it did not create them. It doesn’t have to cast votes and file taxes, and it doesn’t need a passport to travel. So you can give it any name. The virus doesn’t need a nation. It just needs a host to live. Some of its brethren were displaced from their original habitats. And clearly, it doesn't like the new host.

No, Mr. President, it is not a fight between America and China. It is a fight between a virus and humans. And Americans are as human as the Chinese. So are the Italians, Russians, Mexicans, Indians, and Koreans. For the germ, all humans are aliens. It will only be happy if its enemies—the aliens—fight among themselves and become weak.

One option to beat the virus is to send them somewhere else. I prefer to send them to the moon. Let them live there, undisturbed by any human. Or we can send off the humans instead. I reckon President Trump would have liked to transport all those non-Americans to the moon, if science were so developed. But he doesn’t seem to like science either. Neither can he turn to God, for God doesn’t want to see His children live in the moon—He hasn’t made it habitable. Evidently, He wants all Americans and non-Americans to live on earth. Likewise for the virus—they have to live in this planet.

It doesn’t look like a good idea to propagate American-versus-Chinese or Nepali-versus-Nigerian narratives at this hour. Maybe we can come together and start a human-versus-virus fight. I don’t know if President Almighty thinks otherwise.

One thing is for sure—God wants humans and all others to find a way to live harmoniously. We cannot expect the virus or the bats or badgers to take a lead on that. Only we humans can do that, if we have the will and zeal to respect God’s will.

But how do we do that? It calls for having a little sense and thinking better than bats.

There are three ways to do that: two human and one divine. First, trust the scientists and let them find a vaccine to beat the virus. It will take a few months to a few years. Second, don’t disturb the viruses and let them live in their natural homes: bats, for instance. Why do we need to eat bats at all?

Those are the human ways. The third, divine, is the way of compassion. It is the way to have a little love and care for each other, open your eyes and see others as humans, to come together, forge consensus, and build a common strategy for everybody on the planet.

Prime Minister Modi’s Indian government has never liked SAARC, but he thinks unified action is needed to fight the disease. It was wise of him to initiate a regional dialogue to keep the virus at bay. Crises need both long-term and short-term strategies. Social distancing and shutting down of airports are short-term measures. Cooperation guided by human compassion is the long-term solution. Let’s not fail on any of these fronts.

Nepal is not as panicky about Covid-19 as the rest of the world. The reason? Nobody in the country has tested positive for the virus bar one person, who has now been cured.

But there were jitters across social media when Dr. Sundar Mani Dixit, a prominent physician and human rights activist, organized a press meet on March 17 to give voice to his frustration with existing anti-corona measures: “They claim there is no case of novel coronavirus in Nepal. But how can there be any when they don’t test?”

“We don’t have specialized test kits. Even the few available kits are for VIPs. From my hospital, we had sent three patients for coronavirus testing. But none of them could be tested,” Dixit added. 

Worried retweets and Facebook shares followed. Yet a section of people also dismissed Dixit’s claims and said he was only trying to sensationalize things.

The central government lab at Teku—the only place in the country to test for Covid-19—acknowledges that the number of tests carried out is not enough to give an accurate picture. Till we went to press on March 19, the lab had tested just 529 persons. Only one person returning from China tested positive on January 13. He has completely recovered, but those he came in contact with have not been tested.

So does Nepal now have active Covid-19 cases? No one can say for sure. But as the World Health Organization Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus put it in late February: “No country should assume it won’t get cases. That would be a fatal mistake, quite literally.”

Lack of knowledge about Covid-19’s status in Nepal has helped maintain social calm to an extent. “From what I hear, we still have enough in vital supplies,” says Roshan Mishra, director of Taragoan Museum and a keen social observer. “Everything seems to be within limits till now. But you can never be too complacent.”

Rumor has it

The government’s poor public information system creates plenty of doubt. And given a general lack of trust in the government, rumors spread and soon become ‘facts’.

On March 18, the government announced closure of schools and asked people to stay indoors, to mixed reaction. On social media, some said it was a good precautionary step, while others dismissed it as scare-mongering.

Nonetheless, people in general still seem optimistic as they continue to hold parties and shake hands in public. That doesn’t mean people are not worried though.

Over the phone, an insurance agent asked APEX if the government was hiding information about dozens of identified coronavirus patients kept in isolation. Another query was if the Chinese Embassy was putting pressure on authorities not to test its nationals in Nepal. Such rumors abound.

Caught between all sorts of social media rumors and lack of credible information, a large section of the people seems to have taken the attitude of ‘ignorance is bliss’. Many take it for granted that Nepalis have strong immunity as they are used to living in ‘less than hygienic’ conditions. Some resort to popular sarcasm: The country is, as always, under the benevolent gaze of Lord Pashupatinath, so no need to worry. A doctor even posted a joke on Twitter: Coronavirus cannot survive the dust and smoke of Kathmandu.

But the level of anxiety is slowly creeping up.

“Yes, there is anxiety among the people, and that is natural in such cases. We don’t know much about the new virus. And you know how it has dominated news and social media,” says Dr Kapil Dev Upadhyaya, a senior physiatrist and counselor. “People know that we don’t have enough hospitals. If there are cases that need hospital care, it would be complete chaos given the country’s medical capacity.”

Although no one has visited Dr Upadhyaya with corona-related anxiety yet, he foresees social anxiety increasing manifold if a few positive Covid-19 cases are identified.

Officials at the Sukraraj Tropical & Infectious Disease Hospital, the country’s sole hospital dealing with infectious diseases, are also aware of rising public anxiety. “There is anxiety in every house. Everywhere, people are talking about masks and buying kitchen rations,” says Dr. Anup Bastola, the hospital spokesperson. “Even medical professionals and government officials keep asking us what is the real situation as if we are hiding facts. That clearly shows how anxious they are.”

Perhaps some anxiety is justified too. A single lab in the country caters to 30 million people. We don’t know if we have standard kits or if the tests are reliable; Dr Dixit’s claim about absent kits cannot be brushed aside. Nepalis travelled to and from China, South Korea, and other countries—unrestricted—for over two months after the outbreak in Wuhan. Few of these travelers have been tested.

Corona vs common flu 

Covid-19 is killing people around the world. But other ailments such as common flu kill just as many—if not more.  

According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), since 2010 influenza has resulted in between 9 million-45 million illnesses, between 140,000-810,000 hospitalizations, and 12,000-61,000 deaths annually in the US. In 2018/19, an estimated 34,000 people died from it.

A research published in the International Journal of Infectious Diseases estimated that an average of 5,290,000 influenza-related illnesses occurred in Italy each winter between 2013/14 and 2016/17. That led to over 68,000 deaths during the four years. Italy’s National Health Institute said there were about 3,883,000 cases of viral infections in the country from September 2017 to January 2018.

Alarming statistics. But why aren’t people so anxious about them? Maybe because while a lot is known about seasonal influenza, we know far less about the novel coronavirus.

“First we have poor understanding of the new virus. Next, it has a high transmission rate,” says Dr. Tista Prasai Joshi, a microbiologist with the Nepal Academy of Science and Technology. “Then there is the initial period where an asymptomatic infected person may transmit the virus on to many people. That makes it unpredictable, and therefore worrisome.”

As per different studies, a person infected with seasonal flu spreads the disease to 1-3 persons on average. In the case of Covid-19, the number ranges from 2 to 4. Likewise, for the flu, the incubation period, when symptoms are not seen in the virus carrier, ranges from 1 to 4 days. It may go up to 14 days for Covid-19, during which time an unsuspecting person can infect others. And the fatality rate for flu is 0.1 percent or less, whereas that of Covid-19 is between 1 to 3.4 percent, or even higher.

In Nepal, as people wait in fear of an imminent outbreak, not the least because of the country’s open border with India, celebrated writer Nayan Raj Pandey tweets: “We are in a dilemma, what should be the level of our fear and what should be the level of precaution. There are excuses not to be too scared. But there are plenty of reasons and facts to make you nervous as well”.