Exitplan 1.0 or Lockdown 3.0?

India remains in Lockdown due to CoronaVirus. The official lock down in India started on March 25th and today marks the completion of the 40th Day. From tomorrow LockDown 3.0 begins for another 2 weeks though I prefer to call it Exit Plan 1.0. There are 2 groups of people as I see it and specially during my interactions with various people on Social Media. One group of people wants the lockdown to be removed and alternatively there is another set of people who believes that lockdown should continue. I am of the opinion that the lockdown should be lifted. I give my reasons below.

Lets first look at the major reasons of deaths in India which is connected to any kind of disease. 

Heart Ailment: 15.4 Lakhs

COPD (Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) : 9.6 Lakhs

Cancer: 7.8 Lakhs

Stroke: 7.3 Lakhs

Diarrhoeal Diseases: 7.2 Lakhs

50% of all Indian deaths every year are due to the above 5 causes. As I was browsing through various data, I came to know that close to 2 Lakhs Indians lose their lives due to road & rail accidents alone. So why am I discussing this?

Simple, because a big percentage of Indians have become fearful of this virus. Yes, life after Corona Virus won’t be the same again. Didn’t all our lives change after 9/11? So we have to accept that Corona Virus is dangerous and we need to be careful and try and live with it. Indian Corona Positive cases is one of the lowest in the world after 10 Lakh tests. The percentage of Indians getting infected by Corona Virus is 4%. Just to bring things to perspective in USA, the rate is 18%. Add this to the current Indian mortality rate of 3% due to Corona Virus and we get an approximate figure of deaths which would still be less than what we have for heart ailment.

So why not make a phased out proper exit plan rather than lockdown? Many people will disagree with me but my point of view is that the after effects of this Corona Virus is too gloomy. Auto Industry, Aviation Industry and Travel & Tourism industry will not see almost any business in the next 6 months to one year. These 3 industries together contribute close to 19% of the Indian GDP and employs close to 4.5 Crore people. Even after lockdown eases these industries wont be able to get back to pre-corona days for another 2 years. One can understand that Aviation and Travel & Tourism will remain affected but why not start the rest of the industries? We need to come out of this fear factor otherwise we will have severe ramifications in Indian economy. Its not that, the country opens after 5-6 months and things will get normal in 2 weeks. It will take 3 times more to bring us back to normal. Hence its better to accept this new normal and create a proper exit plan. My ideas on the same are given below. Most of it are supposed to be followed in Green zone districts across India but I think all zones should be opened because if the major cities remain closed then over all functions will remain too low.

1. Decentralise monitoring control with the local administration in full charge.

2. Containment zones to be properly and effectively monitored. 

3. The entire population of senior citizens above 60 years of age to remain at home. 

4. Activities which can continue by staying at home should continue in the same mode.

5. All offices and factories should be given SOP (Standard Operating Procedures).

6. Other than Containment areas, rest of India should be open to work.

7. Airlines, Trains, Malls, Theatres, Stadiums, Education Institutes, Religious Congregations etc should remain closed.

8. SOP should be provided for all Bus Operators and Taxi Operators and local administration should strictly follow all protocols.

9. All e-commerce activities should be allowed.

10. Testing should continue as usual and all positive cases should be isolated.

11. As citizens, all need to follow the rules and if feeling sick one should remain at home.

This way, we will be starting to roll the wheels again. Physical connection with unknown people will still be less because one is mainly going to office and coming back home. When a person meets a less number of people and continues to meet the same circle daily then if one is not infected, then the others won’t be infected as well. So with a little bit of planning, proper execution and support from the citizens will help the Indian economy to come out of slumber faster than other global economies.

Yes, there is a possibility of spiking of positive cases but as my above data showed, the percentage of asymptomatic cases being high and mortality rate being low, we just need to be a little careful and things will be OK. Ofcourse there will be some people who won’t be comfortable with this arrangement and they can continue to stay at home. 

I do believe as India partly opens tomorrow, all people who will be stepping out after 40 days follow the set protocols strictly. I also hope that the panic surrounding Covid-19 needs to stop. This is not helping anyone. More than 80% of the Indian population is struggling today and there is no one to help them. They have to help themselves and for that to happen, work must start. 

If Exit Plan 1.0 doesn’t move to Exit Plan 2.0 in the next 2 weeks then India will be looking at an economic crisis which will be far graver than what happened before 1991. Hope good sense prevails!

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