There is a lot of curiosity building that why coronavirus cases are increasing in India, despite posing nationwide lockdown.COVID-19 cases are still rising by each passing day (2000 cases per day approx.). Till the 4th of May India has reported 43000 confirmed COVID-19 cases and in no time, it may reach 50,000. Researchers in India have started trying to understand the mechanism lying behind it. In this report we are going to discuss five reasons which might be worsening India’s situation to fight against COVID19:
1. Nutrition challenges:
India is a country with the largest ratio of young people (3 out of every 5 people). It gave India a benefit as Covid-19 cases are more in elder people. On the contrary if we check the nutritional status of Indian youngsters, it is very poor in comparison to places like China or Italy. Indians are very less concerned about developing a good immune system and are indulged in unhealthy food habits. When we observe our grandparents, we see that they are much healthier than the young generation as they were involved in healthy lifestyle practices.
2. Group testing:
Massive testing is important to monitor the prevalence of the virus at different times and geographical areas. It has been shown by countries like South Korea. It can be done by attempting not to just identify infected individuals but rather determining the size of group testing that maximizes the number of individuals whose testing demonstrates they are not infected. It is better to use a test to detect the virus in another untested group than to try to discover who is infected in a positive group. In this way, we may keep control of the pandemic.
3. The Difficulty of social distancing:
After the strictest nationwide lockdown was imposed by the government of India it became very difficult to maintain 1.3 billion people practicing social distancing. Every possible measure was taken to make people understand the importance of social distancing in flattening the curve of COVID-19 cases, though some people did understand it but still there were many people coming out of their houses without any appropriate reason. Indians also faced a problem of circulation of fake news which made the situation more difficult.
4. Less PPE:
India with inadequate hospital facility and fewer medical staff is facing a crisis of less personal protective equipment. It is making medical staff who is looking after the COVID-19 patients more vulnerable in getting infected as a result several doctors and nurses have tested positive in cities like Delhi and Mumbai. There are concerns that if the lockdown is lifted the less amount of PPE can pose a major threat.
5.More asymptomatic cases:
The incubation period of COVID-19 is 14 days approx. (though it varies from person to person) i.e., it takes 14 days for a person who comes in contact with the virus to show the symptoms. But there are certain cases that even if the person is infected with the virus it doesn’t show symptoms which is known as the asymptomatic condition. After India got its first case till the lockdown, many people were already infected and thus there may be a lot of people who were asymptomatic without their knowledge and thus can be termed as silent spreaders. Indian Council of Medical Research said that out of every 100 people with infection 80 do not have symptoms. Thus, door to door surveillance is necessary as using this model India was able to irradicate polio.
Thus, as an individual we can help the government by STAYING AT HOME and be a smart citizen. We can also indulge ourselves in food which will help to build a strong immune system.
“How many of you know about probiotics?” Tell me if you want to know about it in my next blog.And also, if you enjoyed this blog have a look at our previous post.
REFERENCE:
-Gollier, C. and Gossner, O., 2020. Group testing against Covid-19. Covid Economics, 1(2), pp.32-42. –Klein, E., Lin, G., Tseng, K., Schueller, E. and Kapoor, G., 2020. COVID-19 for India Updates (Doctoral dissertation, Princeton University).
