Pakistan, May 7 -- The French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte once remarked, "Water, air, and cleanness are the chief articles in my pharmacy." He seemed to have traversed the right course. Clean water undoubtedly remains the safest of drinks, despite human progress over centuries, having several remedial properties as well.

Clean air is a blessing unavailable to the majority of humankind and is likely to get more scarce with the monster called climate change. Similarly, the state of being clean is the gateway to everything good from honour and integrity to spirituality and inner purity. We are even told in the Holy Kor'an (2:222): that God loves those who turn to Him and who keep themselves clean. Yet, it takes a pandemic occurring once in a...