Working at health facilities at the peak of Covid was one of the most challenging jobs but the pandemic was not without an upside – it brought people together in an unprecedented way.

This was the upshot of a discussion on ‘Pandemic: Doctors’ Stories from the Frontlines’ which was one of the sessions on the concluding day of the 10th Lahore Literary Festival (LLF) at the Alhamra Arts Centre.

A distinguished panel comprising Dr Faisal Sultan, special assistant to prime minister on health, Dr Roopa Farooki (a British novelist) and Dr Saad Shafqat shared insights into how they, along with other health practitioners, treated Covid patients and helped the general public cope with the stress and anxiety while working on the frontline. Journalist Saima Mohsin moderated the session.

These were indeed depressing times and every new day threw up a different challenge but the silver lining was that people rose to the occasion and there seemed to be a national sense of coming together, said Dr Shafqat. He also spoke about how other passions and pursuits such as literature and writing helped people in general and doctors in particular in these times.

Dr Shafqat, who is also a writer of acknowledged standing, stressed that creative pursuits offered people an escape and it was kind of a safety valve for the doctors dealing with Covid patients and staying away from families.

Dr Farroki shared her experiences as a fighter on medical front which she has penned in a book ‘Everything is true’. What made her story poignant was the fact that she lost her sister to cancer while saving so many other lives by working day in and day out. The personal tragedy was quite traumatic for her but the pain and suffering of Covid patients “changed my perspective”.

“One thing I realised was that an individual’s grief was just a drop in the ocean… there was a flood of tragedies. Everyone’s sister, mother or a dear one lost life,” said Dr Farroki.

Dr Faisal Sultan recalled the early days of outbreak of the virus when “no one knew how to fight and the systems stressed out.” However, he said, a calibrated response based on scientific research and data lent credibility to the efforts to fight the disease. He said it’s very difficult to compare the countries in terms of their response and big countries such as the US and India suffered the most.

He said there were several myths amid a plethora of opinions and one of those was that shutting borders could curtail the virus. “It was very difficult to take decisions and communicate these to people,” he said while using the analogy of juggling balls in the air. But it was scientific knowledge and great communication which helped save lives, said Dr Sultan.

Answering a question about the Covid scenario, he said (on a lighter note) it required a bit of clairvoyance but “the bulk of dangerous waves seems to have passed, though the virus may not altogether vanish.” The need to wear masks at crowded places is very much there, he said.

The three doctors also spoke about vaccine inequity and the remarkable role of the manufacturers and the fact that how it saved lives. The session came to an end with a standing ovation for the doctors who graced the occasion and, by extension, to all those who put their lives on the line to save lives of others.

ON WRITING: Ahdaf Souief, an Egyptian novelist, and Mohsin Hamid entertained the audience with their pleasing knack of expression while speaking about their respective writing journeys.

Muneeza Shamsie moderated the session titled ‘Writings; its Promises and Disappointments’ attended by a number of literature lovers.

Answering a question about aspiration or how she embraced writing, Souief said it was not planned but she read a lot and eventually thought of putting pen to paper and making out her name perhaps “like a rockstar”. She said she started writing after finishing her PhD.

Hamid didn’t want to be a rock star, though he was an avid reader in the days when “there was one TV channel and no Internet”. He read the works of literary greats such as Bapsi Sidhwa and realised that “it was a different universe – me and writers”. “I began with script-writing at the college and eventually stumbled into the profession,” said Hamid whose works have been translated into 40 languages.

Souief also shared a writer’s feeling and the “pleasure of working on the page”. It’s a really good feeling of creating a world of books, she said. The writer also informed the listeners why she turned to non-fiction saying “I hijacked myself into non-fiction because of circumstances.”

Hamid drew a comparison between fiction and non-fiction and claimed his proclivity for the former which, in his view, was more honest and truthful than the latter. “There is an element of honesty in fiction as we stay in a world of imagination.” Souief, on the other hand, takes pride in “using her skill as a novelist to write accurate reportage of Palestine.”

Towards the end, icon Mohsin Hamid highlighted the issue of shrinking space for the Press and the writers in Pakistan. He also addressed the oft-repeated question whether one can earn enough through writing by suggesting it is better to have another job and pursue writing as a passion which he did in the beginning.

Published in Dawn, March 21st, 2022