LUCKNOW: In a pleasant surprise for Team Yogi, a word of praise for the Uttar Pradesh government’s handling of COVID-19 crisis came from an unexpected quarter when an editor of Pakistan’s popular newspaper Dawn compared the pandemic scenario in his country with that of Uttar Pradesh, which has roughly the same population.
Fahd Hussain, Resident Editor of Islamabad edition of the newspaper, tweeted how the state had strictly enforced the lockdown while Pakistan failed to do so, resulting in a grim scenario.
Husain tweeted a graph comparing the COVID-19 casualty figures in Pakistan with that of Uttar Pradesh. The graph shows that Pakistan, with a population of 208 million, has reported deaths almost seven times higher than UP which has a population of 225 million.
“Death rate of Pakistan and Indian state of UP. Both have roughly the same population profile & literacy. Pakistan has lesser density/ km and higher GDP/capita. UP was strict with the lockdown. We were not …” he tweeted.
In another tweet, he said while UP has a lower mortality rate than Pakistan, Maharashtra has a higher rate despite the younger population and higher GDP/capita.
“We must know what UP did right and Maharashtra did wrong to learn the lessons right.”