Muslims and challenges of an infections ravaged world (1)

Before the 13 January, 2016 World Health Organisation (WHO) declaration of Liberia as Ebola-free, 11,315 people reportedly died from the disease in six countries – Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, the US and Mali – after over 21 months of the first confirmed case recorded on 23 March 2014. About 28,637 other cases were reported. […]

Before the 13 January, 2016 World Health Organisation (WHO) declaration of Liberia as Ebola-free, 11,315 people reportedly died from the disease in six countries – Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, the US and Mali – after over 21 months of the first confirmed case recorded on 23 March 2014. About 28,637 other cases were reported.
The dust of Ebola has barely settled when the Zika Virus took the world centre stage and is running alongside the equally deadly Lassa fever.
Incidentally both Ebola and Zika were reportedly discovered in Africa; Ebola in 1976 near the Ebola River in Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo) and Sudan, while Zika’s earliest was in 1947 in Entebbe, Uganda.
While the Zika virus was subsequently isolated from a human in Nigeria in 1954, confirmed cases of infection from Africa and Southeast Asia were rare until 2007, when a major epidemic occurred in Yap Island, Micronesia Western Pacific Ocean, resulting in hundreds of deaths.
Unlike the dreaded Ebola virus which recorded high and contagious fatality, Microcephaly, an abnormal smallness of the head, which is a congenital condition associated with incomplete brain development, remains officially seen as the most severe of the consequences of Zika virus apart from few recorded deaths.
The Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said the Brazilian health authorities reported more than 3,500 microcephaly cases between October 2015 and January 2016. Some of the affected infants have had a severe type of microcephaly and some have died.
Associated with Zika are the Dengue, yellow and chikungunya types of fevers transmitted by blood-sucking arthropods (mosquitoes, ticks and sand flies).
Many countries of the world are taking measures to forestall outbreak in their society.
Nigeria had her doses of Ebola and Lassa and cannot afford to be hit by the Zika epidemic even as it is declared a global health threat.
With the above brief on some of the recent plagues rocking and world resulting in deaths and destruction, one begins to wonder if humanity that has advanced technological innovations and breakthroughs has lost the Allah-endowed knowledge of intuition of preventive and curative measures of ailments. One also wonders the input of the Muslim scientists and other health experts in tackling these diseases.
Prophet Muhammad (salallahu alaehi wasalam -peace be upon him-) as narrated by Abu Hurairah and recorded by Bukhari said: “There is no disease that Allah has created except that He also has created its treatment.”
While there have not been a pronounced cures for the trio of Lassa fever, Ebola and Zika viruses, early reporting, isolation and other forms of hospital-based interventions may improve the chances of survival and reduce the risks of transmission and contagion.
Among other measures of containment are frequent washing of hands with soap and water.
This was not however in deference to the Global Hand washing Day (GHD) initiated at the annual World Water Week in August 2008, in Sweden to motivate and mobilize millions worldwide to wash their hands with soap as a key approach to disease prevention.
However before the advent of GHD, it is widely known that Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) enjoined Muslims to wash their hands before and after meals.
Also, the WHO and various health officials have warned that people avoid travelling to infested areas, while those already affected were isolated and restricted. Some countries closed their borders and took other extreme measures to contain spread.
This is among what Muslims have adhered to time immemorial.
In an explanation of Imam Nawawi’s Forty Hadith, it was explained by a scholar that: Umar bin al-Khattab was travelling with a group of Sahabahs during his Khilafah (leadership). They were coming to a town when they heard that it had a contagious/infectious disease (cholera). ‘Umar asked his group whether they should proceed or go back (to Madinah). The majority of the Sahabahs said they should go back but some said they should proceed. Then one Sahabi said he knew a hadith where the Prophet (pbuh) said, “If you hear that this disease exists in a country, don’t travel to that country.” So Umar decided that they should go back. Another Sahabi (it seems from the second group) asked him whether he was running away from a qadar (destiny). Umar replied that they were moving away from one qadar to another qadar.
This was also practice for animals. Abu Hurairah narrated and recorded by Buhari that the Prophet (pbuh) said, “Do not mix the sick animals (those suffering from a disease) with the healthy ones”.
Each time the hour of prayer arrives the first thing Muslims do is perform ablution (wudu). Ablution entails the washing of all the exposed parts of the body. As a cleansing process, wudu is the equivalent of a half bath. In this way, the devout Muslim takes a half bath at least five times daily.