It is scary.
Either the Government has not learnt any lesson from the experience of the 3weeks’ lockdown, or the PM is unable to express what the Government has learnt and has therefore acted on.
5 things if Government listens to me:
1) My guess is that March salary is more or less paid without cuts. A significant number of people won’t get April salary. This, in addition to the daily wage earner crisis will topple the country’s law and order upside down. Help the businesses to pay salaries. It’s difficult to put money into accounts as the Aadhaar project as an identity program got derailed to an authentication program. Pay the businesses to pay salaries as one of the cash programs. Other cash programs need more thinking. Perhaps paying to the merchant may be an idea. Start an outreach program now.
2) This is an emergency and food stocks need to be utilised like in an emergency giving it in every tehsil and blocks of the country. More emphasis should be given to the URBAN poor. They should be given assistance that they will be taken care of. There should not be any documentation to be presented for food. Believe me, the people who has food at home won’t come out for free food, for fear of Corona. Wherever possible cooked food should be given, using the machinery of the mid day meal program. Most importantly, covid testing should be focused on these resulting activity areas. All distribution centres should be tracked closely for outbreaks.
3) Road / Water / Train Transport should be strategically opened with rules of minimum social distancing. Rules are as follows: 1) Make a map of buses and train routes that are a must to operate for migrant workers. 2) Only 36 Tickets to be issued per train bogey 2) One Ticket per seat of 2/3 in a bus 3) All state transports should pick the tab 4) No standing traffic in any of these public transport. 5) Clear announcements for only essential travel 6) Make approach to train and railway stations narrow / zigzag to minimise and regularise the flow of passengers 7) Increased testing /Tracking of Corona cases in these focused points of likely gathering. 8/ Change the ringtone to announce only essential travel
4) Strategic manufacturing and Goods transport must start with rules of social distancing. With reduced demand, these two sectors will anyway work less than capacity. Daily tracking of these regions for outbreak is a must. We must allow only closed group manufacturing setups and townships. A map has to be drawn.
5) Since we have limited testing infrastructure, we must focus this infra towards economic and social activity areas only, apart from testing the sick. Test, trace and close the area has to be done with increased focus.
Covid 19 like any living organism will try to survive all sorts of intervention, just like we are trying to survive. So it is quite likely that we can’t stop it from spreading. Complete lockdown has not flattened the spreading curve. One day the lockdown has to end and the virus will find its survival instincts. The only way is to spend the lockdown or semi lockdown stage to DISCIPLINE our civilisation into a structure where we see more permanent physical distancing at one side, and more testing and tracing technology on the other side. According to me, scientists should spend more time in getting a more conclusive and cheaper testing infrastructure than to find a cure. Finding a cure for a virus is tough and a cure for a 2% fatal virus cannot be primary focus. Testing and tracing will be an easier bet on our limited resources.
Please don’t let the situation go out of hand. India can not handle a complete lockdown for another 20 days.
Either the Government has not learnt any lesson from the experience of the 3weeks’ lockdown, or the PM is unable to express what the Government has learnt and has therefore acted on.
5 things if Government listens to me:
1) My guess is that March salary is more or less paid without cuts. A significant number of people won’t get April salary. This, in addition to the daily wage earner crisis will topple the country’s law and order upside down. Help the businesses to pay salaries. It’s difficult to put money into accounts as the Aadhaar project as an identity program got derailed to an authentication program. Pay the businesses to pay salaries as one of the cash programs. Other cash programs need more thinking. Perhaps paying to the merchant may be an idea. Start an outreach program now.
2) This is an emergency and food stocks need to be utilised like in an emergency giving it in every tehsil and blocks of the country. More emphasis should be given to the URBAN poor. They should be given assistance that they will be taken care of. There should not be any documentation to be presented for food. Believe me, the people who has food at home won’t come out for free food, for fear of Corona. Wherever possible cooked food should be given, using the machinery of the mid day meal program. Most importantly, covid testing should be focused on these resulting activity areas. All distribution centres should be tracked closely for outbreaks.
3) Road / Water / Train Transport should be strategically opened with rules of minimum social distancing. Rules are as follows: 1) Make a map of buses and train routes that are a must to operate for migrant workers. 2) Only 36 Tickets to be issued per train bogey 2) One Ticket per seat of 2/3 in a bus 3) All state transports should pick the tab 4) No standing traffic in any of these public transport. 5) Clear announcements for only essential travel 6) Make approach to train and railway stations narrow / zigzag to minimise and regularise the flow of passengers 7) Increased testing /Tracking of Corona cases in these focused points of likely gathering. 8/ Change the ringtone to announce only essential travel
4) Strategic manufacturing and Goods transport must start with rules of social distancing. With reduced demand, these two sectors will anyway work less than capacity. Daily tracking of these regions for outbreak is a must. We must allow only closed group manufacturing setups and townships. A map has to be drawn.
5) Since we have limited testing infrastructure, we must focus this infra towards economic and social activity areas only, apart from testing the sick. Test, trace and close the area has to be done with increased focus.
Covid 19 like any living organism will try to survive all sorts of intervention, just like we are trying to survive. So it is quite likely that we can’t stop it from spreading. Complete lockdown has not flattened the spreading curve. One day the lockdown has to end and the virus will find its survival instincts. The only way is to spend the lockdown or semi lockdown stage to DISCIPLINE our civilisation into a structure where we see more permanent physical distancing at one side, and more testing and tracing technology on the other side. According to me, scientists should spend more time in getting a more conclusive and cheaper testing infrastructure than to find a cure. Finding a cure for a virus is tough and a cure for a 2% fatal virus cannot be primary focus. Testing and tracing will be an easier bet on our limited resources.
Please don’t let the situation go out of hand. India can not handle a complete lockdown for another 20 days.
No comments:
Post a Comment
The fun is in knowing how nasty, boring or great fun, it was for you, reading my blog post... Just write in, criticize, praise, add to my thoughts or whatever you feel... it will only add to my perspective.
Thank you for your time. Cheers.