The Sindh government's approach to the Covid-19 challenge deserves praise. It has shown no complacency towards this issue ever since the first coronavirus positive case detected in the province. It has clearly sent - through a host of steps - a message across that it would never prefer businesses to people's lives. Sindh's strategy is vastly different from the rest, including Punjab's. In this regards, I congratulate Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah for directing the health department to start random testing of people at grocery shops and vegetable kiosks so that local spread could be checked and contained accordingly.

He has explained the reason behind his decision by stating that cases of local spread are increasing in equal measure in urban and rural areas. According to him, a villager who recently visited Hyderabad got himself infected there. When he returned to his village he infected a large number of people.

Random Covid-19 tests, in my view, is the right step to quantify the spread of coronavirus.