If decisions are taken urgently, everyone will ultimately benefit including the industries
Dr Javed Jamil | Clarion India
THE major blunder the world has done in its efforts to control Covid spread is that it has not shown urgency in imposing travelling restrictions as soon as the initial cases of a variant appear at a particular place or places, and has imposed lockdowns only when the disease has already spread far and wide. This also happened when Corona made its first appearance in Wuhan.
If urgent restrictions on travelling from and to Wuhan had been imposed, first by China and then by other countries, it could never have threatened the whole world. For several months, air and other travelling services between countries that had already reported cases continued. When it entered a country, the country also did not show any urgency of imposing curbs on travelling to and from the affected cities.
Despite the rapid destruction and almost uncontrollable situation caused by the Second Wave in India, no travelling restrictions between the cities and between cities and villages were imposed with the result that one city after the other and then one village after the other got overwhelmed with patients leading to hundreds of thousands of deaths.
Now, with the Delta plus variant already appearing in many cities and the Third Wave staring at us, again there is absolutely no talk of imposing travelling restrictions to and from the cities affected. If these are strictly done, surely the need of Lockdown will be much less. Even the experts keep repeating the same old formula of social distancing, masks and vaccines. Of course, these are important but the travelling restrictions are of more primary importance.
It is now for decades that I have been writing on the dominance of economics in the world affairs at the cost of everything else including health. The various business sectors including health sector are never interested in eliminating any disease altogether; and are only interested in controlling it up to a point where health sector is able to manage it. Harmful substances and practices including drugs, alcohol, gambling and free sexual life are all big businesses. First the problems are commercialised to the hilt and then the solutions.
If there are no diseases, health sector including Pharmaceutical Industry and Private Hospitals will find it hard to multiply their dividends. This is why, as soon as the cases start showing slight downward trend, one sector after the other starts opening, including Alcohol Industry and night life.
Now, when the Third Wave is being predicted by the experts as only a few weeks away, it is high time the Government decided to put immediate restrictions on travelling to and from the cities that are coming up with the cases of new variant. If decisions are taken urgently, everyone will ultimately benefit including the industries. But yes, society will have to think seriously about the commercialisation of substances and practices that have time and again become the major killers.
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