From hospitals not having enough number of beds to treat COVID patients to shortage of qualified human resources… Every morning when we wake up we are flooded with various news related to the coronavirus. Be it news talking about hospitals and medicines or of police taking action against rule breakers, our lives seem to be centred on COVID-19.

However, there is no dearth of people who do not seem to understand the gravity of the perils that the pandemic has thrust on us. Call them ignorant or foolhardy but what they need to realise is that the current situation is a really serious one with the number of people being infected or dying due to the coronavirus increasing on a daily basis.

And it is for this very reason that the chief district officers of not only Kathmandu valley but other districts too have imposed prohibitory orders to curtail the movement of people and stop the spread of the infection. On Wednesday, the Ministry of Health and Population reported a record high 8,605 new cases of coronavirus infection and 58 deaths. But even these alarming figures do not seem to have deterred some people from avoiding crowds or moving around unnecessarily.

The police have intensified checking of vehicles on the main roads and shops selling essentials are allowed to open only from 7 to 9 in the morning. However, if you walk through the inner lanes and by-lanes of the valley you can see people are still not following the rules that have been imposed to actually save their lives.