Ashutosh Das Sharma
As the nation is locked down, and the keys are handed over to Mother Nature — only to be taken back when she clears the impending doom — we must realise that the situation will only get difficult as days pass. Maybe not worse, but difficult for sure.
As the number of case would invariably rise, the quarantine would need to be stricter, and the lockdown longer. The treatment of the cases with symptoms requiring advanced healthcare would be a very difficult task, given the available health care preparedness which is overtly insufficient even for “a small endemic outbreak” as was witnessed on many occasions in the not very distant past — such as the infant deaths during Japanese encephalitis outbreak in 2018-19. Thus, the lockdown, and the expected “every-citizen isolation” is our best shot at surviving this unprecedented global situation.
For a country of 1,380 million people, out of which an estimated 300 million people live below the poverty line on a hand-to-mouth daily wage, surviving a long lockdown is going to be as difficult as containing the epidemic. The need for resources required to sustain the poorest of our population would most likely overwhelm the availability of resources we have in stores for contingency. In such a scenario, judicious use of what we have at individual and community level is the only way to fight the upcoming battle.
Despite the government’s assurance of an uninterrupted supply of essential commodities, with a population as big as our country’s, the resources might not last for long.
Now the sole responsibility rests on our own wisdom and judiciousness. The way we use the available resources would decide how long we can endure, how long we can hibernate to tide over this adversity, and for how long we can support the many not as blessed as the few of us are. During this difficult time, there will be a considerable number of people who would face challenges in even managing to gather enough to keep their kitchens warm, to keep their children satiated, and even to keep themselves alive.
We are not even discussing the long term financial downfall of industries or depreciated portfolios of salaried middle class. We are talking about a plausible, alternate cause of death of underprivileged citizens forced to stay indoors to save them from dying from another cause.
As we lock ourselves within the relative comforts of our safe houses, we must think about them with our every action. When we prepare a “generous holiday meal”, when we throw the leftovers in the bin, when we take a reviving shower, or get a change of freshly washed clothes, when we turn on the lights to make the hall a little “more” bright, when we stream a high definition video to enjoy it better, when we switch on the air conditioner for a more pleasant April afternoon, we must evaluate, is it really necessary? Are we using just how much we ‘need’, or, are we being inconsiderate and trying to take what we ‘want’ just because we can. Remember, every time you will be using a commodity in excess, someone will be deprived of it. Your effort for some comfort might adversely affect someone else’s chances of survival. Don’t, even for a moment, think that this is another summer vacation while unwind on that couch. It is not. Rather, it might as well be out last summer.
We know our government. No doubt it has taken a very brave step of nationwide lockdown. But we know what it can do, and what it can’t. We have been here long enough to be wiser than expecting it to fulfill all its promises. While we are at it, let’s fight it like what it is: a battle. A battle for our very survival. A battle that will change the way we are used to live for a really, really long time to come.
The writer is attached to the Balco Medical Centre, Raipur.