As with past pandemics in history, the coronavirus pandemic of 2020 will have longer-lasting effects.
Ehsan Masood
We know there’s a mass extinction coming because conservation biologists have been repeating for at least the past two decades that the rate at which species are becoming extinct is higher now than at any time since the last (fifth) mass extinction.
We are at the very beginning of what could be the most serious environmental crisis since the last great Mass Extinction. For the uninitiated, a Mass Extinction is when a significant number of plant and animal species become extinct in a short space of geological time.
Babies and young children are traded all over the world, but in Pakistan child trafficking is believed to be of epidemic proportions. The demand is from a spectrum of society, from leaders of professional begging syndicates, an industry of Bill Sykes in need of their Oliver Twists; to wealthy couples who want to avoid the lengthy process of a formal adoption.
It is a scene that still carries fond memories: the sight of the postman standing outside the front door of my grandfather’s Karachi house laden with a cardboard box marked with the Royal Mail’s trademark red livery. The box would contain books from England, carefully packed by my father who was working in London while… Read more »