What After the 3-Week Lockdown?

Most people would admire India for the quick and determined way it is implementing a three-week lockdown against Covid-19. I personally believe that the coming warm months would be a boon to India in controlling the spread of the virus. However, I do not believe that the number of active cases would be less than 1000 on April 15 when the current 3-week Lockdown is to end, but one cannot imagine extending the lockdown with the same severity. 

What would be the drop in GDP for the current year below what it would have been without Covid-19? How would it compare with the reduction that demonetization of high value currency notes caused? What would be the impact of this reduction on the employment situation?

On the other hand, we cannot go back to business-as-usual on April 15. The virus would very much be there, and we would need control measures. The war on Covid-19 would have to continue. We have a short time in which we have to plan control measures that are medically and economically wise. My suggestion is that we need an easy-to-implement scheme that would permit essential movement to keep the economy ticking, while at the same time making public places less crowded. Non-essential movement of people needs to be effectively controlled. Essential production and movement of goods should be allowed. Essential services should be allowed not just to support survival, but also to support jobs.
Who is going to decide what is essential and on what basis? For instance, should the production of cigarettes and beedis be allowed? What about liquor and lipstick?

I am sure that there are smart people in decision making places, but the world has seen on many occasions the danger of letting a set of insiders make all the decisions without public discussion. So, we have to promote nationwide discussion on an urgent basis. The media have a big responsibility in enabling this. Perhaps every channel should devote an hour everyday for this discussion. Every newspaper should devote a page everyday for this. We cannot probably complete all the discussion required by 5 PM on April 14! We should plan for a gradual loosening of controls starting on April 15, but we do not have all the year to do this. The hot months are going to be the golden months. We should have won the war well before the end of summer. We have to do this without driving millions out of the economy!

Srinivasan Ramani        

Reducing Deaths due to Traffic Accidents

As I write this on 24-March-2020, WHO has reported (Sitrep No 63 dated 23-March-2020) that the total number of confirmed Covid-19 cases reported by Indian authorities was 415 and the total number of Covid-19 deaths was 7. In terms of numbers what matters is a third number: confirmed new cases reported in 24 hours prior to report-publication time. It was 132! It is the rate of increase that concerns the authorities. The Covid-19 threat is no doubt very real.

However, let us not forget other threats. India has approximately 150,000 deaths per year from traffic accidents. That is over 400 deaths per DAY! We should aim to reduce traffic deaths to half the current rate in three years. Do we have the political will to do that?

Srinivasan Ramani