SHOULD INDIA GO FOR LOCKDOWN 5.0

The Government Of India has imposed lock down starting from March-25 and after four phases of extension it will end on May-31,2020.Now it is high time to think whether it should be extended further?But there is no straight answer to it.Lockdown was imposed to curb infections and to buy time to make more Covid hospitals,oxyzen supplies, ventilators & more tests facilities.But in reality we are testing only 0.22% of our population- in a country like India where population is about 130 billon.Secondly:- In India first case was detected on Jan-30,2020.After 3 Months & 3 Weeks of lockdown, infection is spreading fast.Already 138845 people are affected and 4021 people had died so far.Moreover we are testing 100000 tests/day.Considering the Country like India this is not a very significant number.
Thirdly:-Our Economy is on a disarray.According to Anand Mahendra a leading Industrialists in our country :’Extention of Lockdown may lead to Economic Harikiri’.Fourthly:-Moreover it may create a negative psychological impact on the people.
Fifthly:-There may be a huge risks for neglecting non-covid patients.But with the rising infection level in the Country it may not be easy for the policy makers to take a hard decision.According to Anand Mahindra ‘Policy makers should not expect a swift flattering of the curves as the numbers of the case will continue to increase with rise in number of tests’.’They should give emphasis to build expansion of field hospital beds with Oxyzen lines’.Finally I think we have missed the opportunity.The mechanism of tackling Corona Pandemic is Tracing, Isolation & Tests.But we are testing only 0.22% of our population.Our Policy makers do not understand the importance of tests,only last two weeks we have crossed One Lack Tests/day mark.In this scinario we have destroyed our economy completely.Lock down is authoritarian measure only suits for Communist country like China.Being a democratic & free country from 1947 after gaining independence from British the only ways we can handle Covid-19 are Tracing, Isolation & Tests, Social distancing,educate the people for wearing masks & sanitisation of both palms as much as you can with soap & Sanitiser for 20 Seconds atleast.We should also wait for the Vaccines as and when it comes.Anjan SarkarDate:-27-05-2020