An avertisements in this newspaper announced that some low lying areas in Malir and Landhi will be sprayed for several days with insecticides have many ironies. First, the instructions leave out the timings for spraying and therefore assume people to wait all day long for the plane to arrive; of course, there is little to do all day anyway except to wait for a sortie. Secondly, the spraying announcements present a dichotomy of safety. The instructions warn to keep infants away and utencils [sic] covered and have them washed (not just wash them) afterwards (why not wash infants?) that connotes safety hazard. Yet, the plan calls for an indiscriminate spray of citizens like they were crops. Nowhere in the world would a government agency dare to bring such chemical warfare against its own citizens no matter how undesirable they are. Hey! Are you listening, Saddam! Regardless of the precautions suggested in the printed media, people will inevitably get exposed to these hazardous insecticides. (Question: are we using one of the cheap insecticides that have long been banned worldwide?) How about the shops and hawkers selling exposed food, meat and vegetables? Would they close their business for the entire day? Or how about people with no roof on their head? How would they protect their infants? Or how about the people who have no one to wash their dishes for them in the aftermath?

Finally, if this seems to be the only method to eliminate disease, why isn't the whole city sprayed? Perhaps because the health hazard can not be extended to the elite of the town? Ideally, the spraying should be done using a safe and certified insecticide in portable sprays only during the night to protect citizens. It should be done throughout the city, not just the low-lying (in this case low-income) areas. Unfortunately, this otherwise well-meaning attempt falls in the same category of depthless and dimensionless knee-jerk attempts that our government agencies specialize in concocting to give you an impression that something is being done while nothing is intentded. It's just a hogwash. Reading these badly worded, disoriented and disjointed advertisements only brings good belly laughs and that should have some health benefits. (Here is one more health tip: Read one government advertisement a day). Welcome to the city of comic relief.

[23 August 1994 The Daily Dawn]