Coronavirus Reads, Digest 26
India eases restrictions but sees highest single day rise in infections, US projections show deaths could be much much higher.
It’s Tuesday, May 5th.
India’s cases have crossed 46,000, and in the last 24 hours cases have risen by 3,900 (the highest single day rise in cases, and with 195 deaths, the highest single day of fatalities).
As the infections continue to rise, the country has entered the 3rd phase of its lockdown, and has relaxed some restrictions.
Chaos ensued in certain cities including Delhi, especially as liquor shops reopened, calling into question the ability of the public to maintain social distancing as restrictions are relaxed.
Covid-19 update: Bustle, chaos as lockdown 3.0 begins, Hindustan Times.
This has resulted in the Delhi government levying a 70% tax on alcohol. Is this the right call?
The Maharashtra government is capping the cost of hospitalization for Covid-19 at private hospitals after complaints of exorbitant bills from private medical facilities. Will other states follow this model?
COVID-19 | Maharashtra invokes five laws to cap high private hospital costs, The Hindu
The crisis and row over migrant workers trying to get home continues. Hundreds of migrants have been asked to pay for train tickets home despite being out of work for the last 6 weeks. The central government, the Railway Ministry and the states are having a continuous back and forth over the responsibility of who should’ve borne the cost.
Modi govt claims it's paying 85% of migrants trains' cost but has no 'ticket' to prove it, The Print
On top of this, red-tape and bureaucratic hurdles are posing further hurdles for these workers as they’re waiting for as much as 6-8 hours in line to get a medical certificate to declare them healthy. Those forms cost more money and also ask for passport size photographs, but photo studios are not open.
Maharashtra: Paying from pocket, some migrants almost home, others struggle for permission to travel, The Indian Express.
Meanwhile the Indian government will charter 64 flights to bring back Indian nationals stranded abroad. Flights from London to India will cost 50,000 rupees and US to India will be 1 lakh rupees per passenger. Details and the full pricing chart in the following report.
Vande Bharat Mission: 64 flights to bring back citizens from abroad, govt announces ticket prices, The Indian Express.
Indian journalists continue to be highly affected, with over 100 testing positive officially. Soutik Biswas in the BBC on How Covid-19 is ravaging India's newsrooms.
After 6 Weeks, is the Infrastructure Ready for Reopening?
As the lockdown period winds down, questions are being raised on how the past 6 weeks have been used to prepare the country for the rise in infections.
While testing has certainly gone up, India’s testing rate is still among the lowest. Part of the reason continues to be that there are still not enough testing kits. One shipment of the rapid antibody tests from China have been found to be faulty, another set has not been delivered.
A reminder that a strong testing infrastructure is critical in order to reopen and relax restrictions. Now that India is slowly reopening, without enough testing, there could be a surge in cases and chaos.
The Huffington Post reports that this is due to bureaucratic mishandling and poor administrative execution. The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) had been tasked with procuring test kits-- it is primarily a research organization which has struggled with executing tenders of kits.
In addition, there is a global rush for testing kits and PPE, but the Indian approach has continued to be bureaucratic and insisting payment will be given on delivery of kits, while US administrators are cutting checks worth millions of dollars for their bids.
Test Kit Shortage: ICMR's Crucial Mistakes Wasted India's Lockdown, Huffington Post
The eastern state of West Bengal has come under fire for hiding Covid-19 deaths, and listing deaths due to co-morbidities on death certificates. It already has been area of concern due to its low testing but high positive ratio. Now the central government has flagged it as well, a team that observed the issues on the ground has noted that W Bengal has the highest Covid-19 mortality rate in the country, at 12.9%.
Highest death rate, low testing, number mismatch: Central team red-flags Bengal, The Indian Express
US and International
In Europe, several countries including Italy, Germany, Spain and Lithuania are also relaxing restrictions, despite worrying about surges of new infections.
The NYTimes reports the Trump administration is privately estimating that coronavirus deaths in the US will be much higher, with potentially 3,000 daily deaths by June 1st and a staggering 200,000 new cases each day by the end of the month. This, while encouraging states to reopen.
The Washington Post has the inside story of 34 days of the Trump administration from March 29th till this week, “documenting Trump’s month-long struggle to reopen America is based on interviews with 82 administration officials, outside advisers and experts with detailed knowledge of the White House’s handling of the pandemic.”
A longer read from The New Yorker on the reasons for the US’s lack of preparedness for the coronavirus. Why Weren’t We Ready for the Coronavirus?, by David Quammen.
In addition to the right-wing operatives, new reporting shows that “anti-vaccination” (anti-vaxxers) activists are also leading the protests to fight restrictions to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
Ibram X Kendi describes how the current protests, and battle over the way to proceed during the pandemic echoes the language and juxtaposition the country used over slavery. An excerpt:
Slaveholders desired a state that wholly secured their individual freedom to enslave, not to mention their freedom to disenfranchise, to exploit, to impoverish, to demean, and to silence and kill the demeaned. The freedom to. The freedom to harm. Which is to say, in coronavirus terms, the freedom to infect.
Slaveholders disavowed a state that secured any form of communal freedom—the freedom of the community from slavery, from disenfranchisement, from exploitation, from poverty, from all the demeaning and silencing and killing. The freedom from. The freedom from harm. Which is to say, in coronavirus terms, the freedom from infection.
From the beginning of the American project, the powerful individual has been battling for his constitutional freedom to harm, and the vulnerable community has been battling for its constitutional freedom from harm. Both freedoms were inscribed into the U.S. Constitution, into the American psyche. The history of the United States, the history of Americans, is the history of reconciling the unreconcilable: individual freedom and community freedom. There is no way to reconcile the enduring psyche of the slaveholder with the enduring psyche of the enslaved.
What Freedom Means to Trump, Ibram X Kendi, The Atlantic
Side Effects of the Pandemic
The need and demand for therapy has escalated as possibly never before, as everyone is well is also anxious and stuck inside dealing with uncertainty and grief. But therapists are also dealing with the same trauma as their patients. Sarah Maslin Nir on the unique phenomenon and how therapists are coping.
Therapists and Patients Find Common Ground: Virus-Fueled Anxiety, The New York Times
Different values about social distancing are affecting friendship, as some take it more seriously than others.
Friends are Breaking Up Over Social Distancing, Ashley Fetters, The Atlantic
If you want to dig deeper than Zoom into a virtual world, Wired has some suggestions for you.
The Berklee Indian Ensemble (they are incredible, follow them on Instagram @berkleeindiaexchange!) has done a reprise of the Dil Chahta Hai title track in collaboration with Shankar Mahadevan and Farhan Akhtar.
Listen to it and watch their Zoom based music video: Dil Chahta Hai : Berklee Indian Ensemble Ft. Shankar Mahadevan | T-Series