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Today it is heartening to note China beating its breasts and exclaiming proudly Wuhan has finally laid to rest the deadly virus it once spawned, bred and spread to the rest of the world.

But is it too early to open the bubbly? Too early to give Wuhan a clean bill of health? The bat borne virus, transmissible from human to human, may have been temporarily slain, but has a stake been driven through its heart to close the lid permanently on its Chinese sojourn?

Like a murderer returning to the scene of the crime, no guarantees can be given that this virus without borders may not make a comeback to the land of its inception, conception and worldwide distribution; that the coronavirus may not revisit its oriental cradle in which it nestled after emerging from its Wuhan womb to condemn the world with fright at the spectre of an early tomb.

THE TOUR GUIDE WHO SHOWED COVID LANKA’S SOCIETY: Relieved after the ordeal, the 52-year-old victim leaves the IDH after a 12-day stay, free of the coronavirus this Monday, March 23

Three months ago when the virus made its debut in the Hubei provincial capital Wuhan, the western world took little note of the brand new discovery and paid not even a microscopic interest in the bizarre star born in the Eastern hemisphere. Only when the first drop of death became a trickle of tragedy and turned to an epidemic flood were eyebrows raised at the uncontrollable devilments the new virus on the block was causing in its unstoppable deathly stride.

Yet no causes for alarm were sounded, no warning bells were rung, no stable gates were barred and no flights to foreign fields from China were curtailed and subjected to medical checks, even after the coronavirus’s initial occupation of Wuhan had rapidly spread, far and wide, with all the regions in the land coming under its tyrannical reign.

The grim reaper was busy with his  scythe mowing down the young and the old, the strong and the frail, the heathy and the ill, the proud and the humble, the greedy and the austere, the rich and the poor, the powerful and the slave, the learned and the knave, the believer and the atheist, the saint and the sinner – all were equal in his gaze which knew no differences in religions, races, nationalities, genders, castes, creeds or colours, all born of the same breath and made of the same dust  unto which, when the last breath has fled the mortal frame, all will return and lie equaled.

The merciless reaper culling China of her seed and blossom was also eyeing new meadows to mow. Even as old colonial nations had voyaged the world on endless missions seeking new lands to plant their flag on it and claim it as their own, even as present day regional and global superpowers exploited every opportunity to expand their spheres of influence and practise their neo-colonialism without a blush, the coronavirus’ irresistible urgings to seek new frontiers to propagate its species for the worse, devilishly drove it to fortuitously board an airline passenger booked on an international flight and, riding piggy back on the unsuspecting human host, take wing to any foreign clime.

When the flight landed at some western port, the officials were totally unaware of the alien stowaway aboard. No drawbridge had been raised, no safeguards made; no fort rampart fortified to prevent its entry.

None had the foggiest that the Trojan Horse had arrived within the castle walls without fuss, without notice, without the slightest hint or nudge; and was lying dormant at the heart of the city centre till its incubation period peaked to ambush the first unwary victim. Europe and the rest of the western world was aghast to find the oriental devil on its doorstep. The coronavirus, in its odyssey of death and disease, had discovered a new continent to wreak havoc as it did its country crawl remorseless.

It was France which lowered the tri-colour standard in surrender when she announced the first COVID death in Europe on February 15. Only three deaths had been recorded from the virus outside of China — in the Philippines, Hong Kong and Japan. This was the first death outside East Asia. The victim, an 80-year-old Chinese tourist, had been receiving treatment at Paris’s Bichat hospital since January 25.

Following the death, WHO emergency chief Mike Ryan said during the Munich Security Conference that the virus is still not spreading fast internationally. He declared: “The virus has been outside China now for a number of weeks and we still have only got just over 500 cases in 24 countries, and those countries are significantly containing the virus.’’

How wrong the experts can get. And be found out in so short a time.

Less than a month after Ryan’s sunny assessment of the COVID crisis, Europe was plunged into dark despair, rendered defenceless before the relentless march of the COVID Dragon who culled the weak and spared not the strong.

On March 11, World Health Organisation Director General Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, realising the gravity of the crisis could no longer be kept concealed from public view, raised the carefree Bohemian curtain to reveal the COVID culture with all its warts.  He declared the epidemic as a pandemic.

In his notice to the world he said: ‘In the past two weeks, the number of cases of COVID-19 outside China has increased 13-fold, and the number of affected countries has tripled.  There are now more than 118,000 cases in 114 countries, and 4,291 people have lost their lives.  Thousands more are fighting for their lives in hospitals. In the days and weeks ahead, we expect to see the number of cases, the number of deaths, and the number of affected countries climb even higher.’

‘WHO has been assessing this outbreak around the clock and we are deeply concerned both by the alarming levels of spread and severity, and by the alarming levels of inaction. We have therefore made the assessment that COVID-19 can be characterised as a pandemic.’

On the day of his declaration, March 11,

USA had reported 1,267 COVID infected patients. As of this Friday March 27, barely 16 days later this then alarming figure has risen to a horrifying 85,601 COVID cases with 1,301 dead.

Italy, home of the Holy See, has spiraled to take the lead in the morbid litany of the dead. The figure of total infections 80,569, active infections 62,013 as of March 27, and, alas, the dead, a shocking 8,215 and rising. Last Wednesday it set a record, 475 victims, for the highest number of COVID patients dead in a day. On Thursday the day’s toll was 427.  On Friday it beat its own macabre record when 627 died of the virus. On Saturday the 21st, it beat Friday’s record toll when 793 succumbed to the virus. Then this Friday, the 27th, the number of people dead were 919.

Neighbouring Spain was no better as the COVID inquisition raided the Mediterranean land and claimed a total of 57,786 infected cases. The death toll: 4,365, demoting China to a thankful third place in the Corona rankings up to March 27.

Germany notched 43,938 with 238 dead; France reported 29,155 with 1,696 dead; Switzerland, which had not been invaded for the last 222 years, found Coronavirus, an enemy of occupation on its neutral soil, swiftly taking the lives of 192 after infecting 11,811.

Coronavirus had also gone island hopping. Hop, step and a jump from the edge of Europe to the sceptred isle of Great Britain. The infected figure: 11,568. The death toll: 578.

When Lanka’s first COVID victim, a Chinese tourist was tested positive for the coronavirus in early February, Britain immediately changed its travel advisory to British citizens of the dangers of travelling here. Its advice stands out today as a testament to British ignorance. Today, the coronavirus has brought the nation to its knees, caused the stiff upper lip to drop when it is besieged by COVID which has infected over 14,000 so far and has claimed the lives of 578 people. Among the affected are the heir to throne Prince Charles and its Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

And as for China, the nation that gave the world the coronavirus, the good news is that the worst seems to be over. Its recovery figures are almost too good to be true. Since the COVID first made its entrance, it has infected a total of 81,340 people in China. Three months later, let the figures hail the good news for itself.  While, during its 90-day untrammeled sprint throughout the land, its scythe had mowed down 3,292, the number of those who survived the single cell rampage is a miraculous 74,588 with only 3,460 actively infected with it. But it’s not yet time to be dancing on the streets, Chinese style. Better brace for a possible second wave like the one that befell the Land of Suzy Wong, Hong Kong, just when she had started shaking a leg to the celebratory music believing the worse had passed.

The worldwide total: Total infected upto March 27, 533,015 out of whom 124,387 have recovered. The total dead, 24,095.  The total presently infected, 384,533.

And that’s only the death toll which is bound to rise over the weekend. The economic costs due to COVID that has turned the world on its head cannot even be estimated at this time.

Across the Palk Strait, at the stroke of the midnight hour on Wednesday India kept her tryst with the COVID crisis as Prime Minister Modi ordered a 21-day nationwide lockdown on a land of 1.3 billion people.

“From 12 midnight today, the entire country will be in lockdown, total lockdown,” Modi said on Tuesday in a televised address to the nation. “To save India, to save its every citizen, you, your family… every street, every neighbourhood is being put under lockdown,” he said, putting nearly one-fifth of the world’s population under lockdown. According to the Indian government this was due to a sharp increase in recent days to 519 infections, including 10 deaths

As for Lanka, the coronavirus has, so far, been kind to the blessed isle. Since March 11, when the first Lankan to be tested positive for COVID on Lankan soil was first reported, the virus seems to have shunned social mixing and has preferred, instead, to be relatively choosy and less promiscuous in its pickings.

After two weeks since the first detection of the 52-year-old tour guide, who walked away from hospital this Monday free of the coronavirus, Lanka’s bed card has thankfully read 106 affected, 9 recovered, zero deaths. Touch wood.

Authorities say that the community has so far been spared. Let’s hope and pray it will stay that way. And rather than gloat we braved the risks and won the COVID war, better keep the fingers crossed and each other at arm’s length for now. Social distancing and not social mixing is the need of the hour to prevent the coronavirus from mingling with crowds and turning not mere serial killer but indiscriminate mass murderer.

Each one of us has to exercise self- responsibility, be aware that, in these harrowing times we live in, one has a duty to one’s self to stay clear of others to curb the COVID spread. Far better to seek the charms in solitude’s arms than court the COVID in public places, seeking delight in numbers and help make the dreaded virus ambush the entire community, one’s self included.

Treat the coronavirus as akin to obnoxious WhatsApp posts or scam you don’t want circulated. Don’t open it. Block it or delete it. Don’t forward it to others who in turn will be sharing it with others ad nauseam till the whole country is infected.

As they say in Sinhala, ‘thadhe sulang wassatai, thadha senei dhabatai or ‘strong winds portend rain; packed crowds foreshadow commotions.’

BETTER SAFE THAN SORRY: Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, UNP Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe, SJB Leader Sajith Premadasa follows advice obediently and wears face masks at Tuesday’s All Party Leaders meeting Off with the masks: New orders from COVID Czar Ever since a Chinese tourist was tested positive for COVID and admitted to the IDH for treatment, the Health Authorities have been bombarding the general public on the measures to be taken immediately to prevent the rapid spread of the dreaded corona. Along with advice to wash your hands with soap for twenty seconds immediately on returning home, to use a hand sanitizer, 60 percent alcohol proof when on the move, to keep one metre distance in public places, presumably in a sardine packed bus too, and, of course, not to forget, the protective face mask and to never leave home without it. Morning, noon and night and sometimes even in restless sleep this message has echoed in our ears over and over again. It has come in print form in the newspapers, blared on television and radio endlessly, so much so the message as familiar as the lyrics in the national anthem; and viewed many a times in many a way on social media that it has become second nature to follow the given advice, especially when we know it is for our good and that our lives may well depend on heeding it. Take for instance, the face mask. It is advised to wear it at all times in public to prevent an infected person sneezing or coughing before your face and sending a drizzle or a flood of snot through which the coronavirus will gain access to your nose and mouth and through them gain entry to the throat and thereafter lay siege on the lungs. But it is not only for that reason. It is to prevent the far more likely occurrence of your hand, after coming into contact with an infected surface, through reflex action of which you have no control whatsoever, rubbing your nose unconsciously or wiping your lips or covering a yawn or picking your teeth in the absence of a toothpick after a meal. If the coronavirus is invisibly plastered on your hand, you’re done for. But a face mask will act as a barrier to making direct contact with the virus and will greatly reduce the risk of you contracting COVID. This message was slowly filtering through to the people and, last Friday, when the curfew was temporarily lifted in the morning hours it was heartening to see many donning masks. Wearing the mask itself has a psychological effect. It unconsciously alerts us to the presence of the COVID and warns us to observe the precept ‘I shall refrain from mingling with crowds and will keep my social distance. ‘ Then, surprise, surprise, Lanka’s COVID Czar Dr. Anil Jasinghe, the Director General of the Health Service, drops a letter — and copied to the general public — on Thursday to the Acting IGP that the wearing of face masks is not essential and to inform the police cadre not to inconvenience healthy people not wearing them. In his letter Dr. Jasinghe informed the police that masks should only be worn by the following individuals: 1.   Any COVID-19 suspected persons 2.   Those who had come into contact with individuals who are suspected of having contracted COVID-19 3.   COVID-19 caregivers 4.   When someone with any respiratory illness is visiting a hospital Furthermore the Health Ministry says it does not recommend the use of masks by everyone right now because: 1.   There is an increased risk for the virus to spread due to improper wear or handling 2.   Chances for virus to spread due to improper disposal 3.   It is better to save the mask you have for if and when there is a major outbreak. Well, fancy that? After a Health Ministry monologue vouching its virtues and warning people not to step out of the house without wearing a face mask, it’s not funny to be told that the COVID Czar Dr. Jasinghe is — apart from stating it is not compulsory gear to wear which we all knew — now advocating a different line, saying our efforts to stem the trickle turning into a flood have all been in vain. That only COVID suspects or infected should wear it and that the healthy need not. Keep the mask for a rainy day, they say now, when a major COVID crisis breaks. But isn’t the purpose of wearing masks to minimise the chances of a major outbreak? However basic a face mask or a face covering is, isn’t it the first line of defence preventing contact with COVID? Why this sudden change of heart? Is the real reason a shortage of face masks? If so, the authourities instead of pooh-poohing the value of the face guard, should take the public into its confidence. A plan should be considered to galvanise the hundreds of garment factories dotting the island now idle to mass produce face masks, even the most basic, to cater to the need of the hour. Even as justice must not only be done but must be seen to be done so must  individual efforts be made but also seen to be made to abate the crisis and ward off a major outbreak. On with the masks. If only to show solidarity with the leaders of all parties, including former twice president Mahinda Rajapaksa, former five times prime minister Ranil Wickremesinghe, former leader of the opposition Sajith Premadasa and the other leading politicians who obediently wore their face masks as advised by the Health Authorities when they attended the All Party Conference on Tuesday and thus set a magnificent example for the people to follow.  An exemplary act which the self-same Health Authorities two days later condemned as superfluous, a folly – even dangerous. Seems the authorities are no better than the rest of us. A group of blind cats in a darkened room desperately searching for the door to exit when no door exists.