speech on coronavirus in india
Answers
Coronaviruses are a large family of respiratory viruses, known to cause illness ranging from the common cold to more severe illnesses such as Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS).
The current outbreak has been caused by a strain of coronavirus that had not previously detected anywhere in the world before the outbreak was reported in Wuhan, China in December 2019.
COVID-19 is caused by infection with the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) virus strain.
Explanation:Speedy and agile efforts to address the COVID-19 pandemic by India's national and state governments, NGOs,
and, in some cases, the private sector seem to be yielding positive results. From augmented resources for health care to the manufacture of personal protective equipment needed to protect health workers to the social solidarity and the overwhelming support from all corners. This essay explores what's working in India at the moment and asks what could be next.
The Present Situation in India
The nationwide lockdown, now extended until May 3, is helping contain the spread of the virus.
But the lockdown has also meant the loss of millions of jobs belonging to daily laborers and informal sector workers—a large proportion of whom are migrant workers. The lockdown has also led to an exodus of many of those same migrant workers from the cities where they worked back to the villages where they lived—close to 700,000 of them (which is probably an underestimation) are stranded across the country. They began to walk thousands of miles to their homes, when the initial three-week lockdown was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India on March 24.The migrants were fleeing the cities as they had lost their jobs but now they have lost their dignity too, largely due to the jolts from the government. They are angry and uncertain of when they will get to go home, and many people face the threat of hunger and starvation. The government has announced an economic relief package to help those workers and also small businesses. But from all counts, the additional food, cash and other benefits being offered are insufficient to reduce the insecurities and uncertainties in people’s lives. Further announcements to address the plight of these families are expected in the near future.
‘They are angry and uncertain of when they will get to go home, and many people face the threat of hunger and starvation’
On the health front, although India’s COVID-19 trajectory is beginning to level off in many parts of the country. According to data provided by India’s Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on April 17, 2020, the number of reported COVID-19 cases rose by 16 percent over the past two days to 13,835—a slower increase compared to the previous forty-eight hours, when the reported case count rose 28 percent to 11,933.
Though these numbers are low by any standards for a country of 1.3 billion people, we need to be cautious of relapses. Skeptics might argue that India is not testing sufficient numbers of people to find out the real extent of spread. There is an element of truth to this statement. But we should not forget that it would be very difficult—if not virtually impossible—in a democratic country like India to conceal serious cases should outbreaks occur even in remote rural areas given how proficient people are in the use of mobile phones for messaging across the country.Media reports point out that India’s COVID-19 curve is flatter than that of several Western nations where the virus has claimed more lives even though it continues to be steeper compared to Asian peers such as Singapore, Japan, and Indonesia.
Such comparisons by the media of India’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic showcase the country in a good light. Containing the COVID-19 virus to a few thousand cases so far is no small achievement for a country with a population of 1.3 billion people. Often forgotten are the challenges of providing health care faced by governments when on the one hand, you have the city of Delhi with a population of nineteen million—and on the other, there are 4,000 villages each with a population of less than 10,000. Equally impressive about the achievements is the fact that India is a lower middle-income country that reported a per capita income of $2,020 in 2018—nearly half of Indonesia’s income and not a fraction near Japan’s $41,310 and Singapore’s $58,770.