On the cusp between two lockdowns—one set to be over and another about to be announced—the fight against Covid-19 does not seem entirely insurmountable. On two distinct parameters, the spread of positive cases appears to have plateaued.
It does not mean we are out of the woods. What it does indicate is that, depending on how the next two weeks go, India could be breathing a bit easy. The virus or the threat from it will not disappear. But the chain of its reproduction could be broken. Kerala, one of the earliest states to be hit, has for now conquered the curve.
Karnataka, which registered the first Covid-19 death, has managed to bring its count below the national average. Telangana, from where Delhi’s Tablighi Jamaat fiasco was detected, and which bore some of the brunt, has shown a linear graph. Yes, Maharashtra is still exponential and Madhya Pradesh may be sitting on a timebomb. But overall, ICMR’s containment plan seems to be yielding results—still a blip, but a slowdown nonetheless. India’s public health infrastructure has shown some shock absorption capability.
Its spread may not be adequate but there are some bright minds at work for sure in India’s public health sector. Countries with much better infrastructure are struggling to cope, in the absence of proper public health planning. Our government-run health sector may yet see us through the darkest tunnel in human history. The Indian lockdown, ranked as the severest in the world, has to now be matched with a stimulus that saves livelihoods along with lives.
Lest the cure for it causes more damage than Covid-19 itself. From farmers to unorganised labour to MSMEs to small-time traders to big business, every single element has been impacted by the virus. Balance will have to be restored somewhere down the line. Economic activities too cannot be made to gasp for breath, beyond a point.