While we are steadily moving towards the crest of a second wave, it is about time we learn and act upon the key lessons gathered from the first wave. During the first wave, we had to fight tooth and nail to coordinate the different aspects on ground implementation, given that India technically never had any prior pandemic protocols in place, unlike many developed countries which have dedicated centres of pandemic preparedness.
Hence, we had to supplement the key mantra of the first wave — Trace, Test and Treat — with two more Ts – Teamwork and Training, more in a reactionary fashion somewhere along the way. The last two Ts being integral foundations to pandemic preparedness, we faced a Herculean task in joining the missing dots at the peak of the pandemic.
Today, India has around 20,000 new cases daily (7-day average). In July last year, when we began our fight against Covid, the average was roughly around the same. At that time, we assumed that every state was plagued with different immunity specifics and genetic makeups, leading to varying levels of protection exclusive to the respective makeup. However, by the time we reached the peak of 1,00,000 cases per day around September, our assumptions were proven nearly wrong. We ended up facing an alarming situation: More than a crore people were infected, and fatalities were close to 1,60,000.
We now need to steer clear of the assumptions of the first wave while locking horns with a set of new challenges. Firstly, we have to confront newer strains of Covid. Secondly, we are still far from full vaccination. We may need to adopt a strategy similar to the Pulse Polio Mission of door-to-door dynamics. This would be a Herculean task, given that we are dealing with injectable vaccines, and the need to monitor potential side-effects.
However, the onus is on the people. They need to optimize and restrict travel, rather than inviting a situation of lockdowns that hit the economy hard. The government will have to formulate policies that strengthen ‘work-from-home’ models and sanitize need-based economic interactions, but the war against Covid can’t be won in hospitals; it can only be conquered at homes. Citizens must hence exercise prudence and caution indoors and outdoors, with stress on adequate ventilation to the extent possible. This day-to-day drill will have to go on until we manage to build a fortress of vaccination around us.
Dr vishal rao
Dean, Academics, HCG Cancer Centre and Member, Expert Committee on Covid task force