A look at researches and studies if the government needs to extend lockdown in India
Prime Minister Narendra Modi took India into an unprecedented 21-days-lockdown to break the chain of coronavirus and stop the spread of COVID-19 in the country. Billions of people are staying in homes to make the lockdown successful but some incidents like a mass exodus of migrant workers and Tablighi Jamaat incident has somehow diluted the containment of coronavirus. Numbers are increasing day by day .Although we have not entered the stage of community transmission, but increasing numbers are horrifying.
Many anticipated that the lockdown could be extended beyond the 21-days period, but a top Indian government official, Rajiv Gauba, Cabinet Secretary squashed those rumours.
Now, let’s understand with some research and facts if government will extend lockdown or not. As per the worldmeters.info, coronavirus positive cases have reached to 3,082 people, while the death toll has crossed 100.
Cases in India is on an increasing trend: Will PM extend lockdown?
The number of cases has more than doubled in less than a week, stroking speculation that India won’t have any option other than extending the lockdown. A mathematical model by Cambridge University suggests that India needs at least 49-days lockdown at minimum to control the deadly outbreak.
The model is prepared by Cambridge scholars R. Adhikari and Rajesh Singh. It indicates that the cases will spark sharply if the restrictions are lifted on 14th April. They suggested a three-step-model to control the spread of pandemic with an alternate option of a seven-week-lockdown- overall.
The two suggested models are: One where the government needs to continue the current lockdown for 49 days. This means the lockdown will continue till 13th May and it will flatten the curve. The other option for India is that once 21-days-lockdown completes, a gap of 5 days can be given and then a 28 days lockdown will be required. Once that 28-days lockdown is over, another gap of 5 days can be given. After this, a final lockdown of 18 days, ending on 10th June will be required to stop the spread of coronavirus.
Read more: COVID-19 infected people are not criminals
But, the problem is, our country doesn’t seem to be prepared for a continuous seven-week lockdown. It will cripple our economy and supply of essential services might increase. However, India has no other option, because neither we have a medical infrastructure for large population nor we have enough health workers to control the chaos.
A study shows, the government might extend lockdown till second week of September
Another study by American consulting firm, Boston Consulting Group (BCG) suggests that lockdown could only be lifted between the fourth week of June and the second week of September. The delay in lifting the restrictions was attributed to again the challenges faced by India in terms of health system preparedness, including the number of beds, number of ventilators, health care workers, availability of testing kits, ICUs, PPE kits and more along with public policy effectiveness.
In India, the lockdown started in line with China’s timing of the lockdown, The report represents estimates based on BCG predictive modelling leveraging John Hopkins University data, as per the situation on March 25, the report said.
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