With 4,016 fresh infections, the number of active Covid-19 cases in Pakistan have reached the highest level of 2021 so far, which is an ominous sign. Already this week Pakistan crossed a number of grim Covid milestones. The number of active cases crossed the 90,000 number for the first time since April, the death toll crossed the 25,000 mark, and the number of critical cases also surged past 5,500. To try and tackle this trend the National Command and Operations Centre (NCOC) has announced that unvaccinated people would not be allowed to use public transport after October 15. These are no doubt very distressing trends not just because the country had done so well during the earlier waves and it seems like such a shame to get caught in the fourth wave so late in the pandemic. It is also very concerning because the economy is poised for a historic takeoff, and it is still struggling to shrug off employment constraints caused by the earlier waves, but now there is a very genuine danger of throwing it off the rails once again.The Sindh government’s latest decision, that schools can be opened shortly but only if all teachers are vaccinated, also works very nicely and should be emulated by other provinces as well. That way, the greatest care can be taken to prevent children from becoming silent carriers and taking illness and death back from schools to their homes. The government will have to come up with more such innovations if this wave is to be overcome because vaccinating the whole country will take a very long time considering our population growth rate alone. It is also high time for people to understand that it will take the combined efforts of all individuals to win this fight. It is very unrealistic to expect the government to do all things because of the simple fact that it is not practically possible for any government to police all the people of any country at all times. Therefore, unless the common folk take the lead this problem is not going to go away. And it is very much in everybody’s interest to follow safety protocols to the letter because otherwise they leave themselves open to not just medical complications, possibly even death, but also the prospect of compromising their livelihood. Hopefully better sense will prevail and the people will lead the country out of this problem yet again. *