EPISODE #7 ONE YEAR OF COVID: INDIA’S SECOND TRYST WITH DESTINY
The pandemic is a tragedy and yet an opportunity to start afresh.
Hi Everyone,
A very happy Monday to you.
Last week was big for the stock markets what with the Sensex piercing Mount 50K. Yes it did drop thereafter. But guess what, we have been promised a ‘once in 100 years union budget’ coming up next Monday. At least that is the buzz from North Block. This could well be base camp for the next peak!
The week just passed was also the first anniversary of India’s first covid-19 case. A year is a long time and in this case a very troubled one too. Among other things the pandemic showed us that health risks need to be taken seriously. Exactly why I review the year gone by and hold a mirror to possible next steps to secure India’s health fabric. Food for thought for Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman.
Thank you Sumod for this week’s pix. The empty streets of Manhattan, the greatest city on earth if you ask me, is the calling card of covid-19.
Once you read this post, please, please do drop me an email with your thoughts or ping me on twitter at @capitalcalculus. It is key to growing this newsletter community. A big shout out to Abhijit (who also shared the sad news about an acquaintance who met with an accident trying to save someone who was on the wrong lane on an expressway. Sooner we nip this bad habit of wrong side driving the better) Premasundaran, Kapil, Krishnendu and Yugainder for going the extra mile to share their thoughts. Would be nice if more of you joined the act. And, many thanks to readers who hit the like button 😊.
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Read on.
THE COVID ANNIVERSARY
This week last year India reported its first case of covid-19. An Indian student who returned to Kerala from Wuhan University in China—the city of Wuhan is ground zero for the covid-19 pandemic which has ravaged the world—tested positive. The last 12 months since have been a series of hits and misses as India (and the world) came to terms with the dangers of a pandemic in a very connected world.
The first takeaway is that this is a serious wake-up call for the entire world. This is not the first virus infecting the world (though it is the first to acquire this scale). And, this won’t be the last. For the last two decades different parts of the world have had to deal with mini-pandemics caused by Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome or SARS, Ebola, H1N1, Nipah, and the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome or MERS viruses.
It is a grim reminder that unmanaged health risks in a globalised world have the potential to cause greater devastation than even the economic meltdown the world witnessed in 2008. What started out as a health crisis last year rapidly snowballed into an unprecedented and full blown global economic crisis. No doubt the subterfuge by China in failing to come clean on the pandemic in the initial months of the birth of the pandemic in Wuhan is a lesson in failing to adhere to transparency. Yes there is no point in engaging in a pointless exercise of ifs and buts, yet it is very plausible that an early warning would have helped mitigation efforts.
The second takeaway is the remarkable medical miracle the world pulled off: A vaccine has been discovered in less than a year. A welcome precedent. Yes, some corners were cut. Understandable given the exigent circumstance. But then net-net it is still advantage mankind. Indian Express ran a must read FAQ by two medical experts detailing the discovery process and efficacy of the vaccine to tackle the novel coronavirus pandemic.
The experts rightly highlight the cogent logic of a successful vaccination programme. They cite India’s Universal Immunization Programme, which immunizes about 26 million children every year.
“It is estimated that every dollar spent on childhood vaccines adds $44 to the economy by ensuring that children grow up to be healthy adults,” the experts said.
In the Indian context the ongoing vaccination exercise is the largest in the world. Like in the case of immunisation of children, the economic gain from this will be enormous—vaccine use can arrest the pandemic and restart economic activity. The contact economy, made up of hospitality and aviation, have been plumbing unprecedented lows resulting in massive lay-offs and of course economic destruction. A revival of the service sector will be like a booster dose for the Indian economy, especially given that it accounts for nearly 55% of the country’s (pre-covid) gross domestic product or GDP.
The third takeaway is that India surprised on the upside (fingers crossed as we are still not out of the woods) in its response to the covid-19. Especially given the state of the health infrastructure, overcrowding in metros and poor hygiene standards in the country. Yes, tragically, a year on, Kerala (along with Mahrashtra) continues to be the epicentre of the pandemic, even while the rest of the country is witnessing a slowdown in the pace of new infections.
In March last year not many would have bet on such an outcome for India. In fact, some were predicting the worst for India. The infamous forecast by Dr Ramanan Laxminarayan, director of the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy, claimed India would end up with 300 million covid-19 infections.
Mercifully this dire prediction was way off the mark. As on 23 January, the dashboard maintained by the World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates the cumulative count of infections in India to be 10.63 million (compared to the 24.41 million logged in the United States with a population size which is approximately a quarter of India’s 1.3 billion).
The fourth takeaway, segueing from the above is that the pandemic has exposed structural challenges facing India’s health system. A grim reminder that the existing public policy framework is inadequate in addressing it. So India can’t be complacent that it dodged the bullet. Instead it should be going that extra mile to etch a brand new script; something that will secure the future health of India.
For starters the health infrastructure is well past the sell-by date. To give you an idea consider the Global Health Security Index co-created by Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security—it ranks 195 countries based on their ability to combat outbreaks like covid-19. India’s ability to prevent, detect, respond and cure was ranked at 87, 67, 32 and 36 respectively.
Clearly what India has going for it is the ability of its health personnel to respond—as we have witnessed in the last one year. Imagine if we were able to provide the requisite health infrastructure, our medical personnel will create miracles. As the cliché goes prevention is better than cure.
Exactly where finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman comes in. At present India’s spending on health is about 1.15% of GDP; it intends to bump this up to 2.5% by 2025. This is abysmal. The FM should on 1 February announce that the deadline is being advanced by four years and that the spending target on health will be upped to 10% of GDP in the next five years. Given how fiscally strapped states are, the onus will be on the centre. With limited resources this is a very tall ask of the FM. But then a once in a century pandemic begets a similar response, right?
Over to FM Sitharaman.
Recommended Reading
Last week we lost one of the finest science journalists ever to the scourge of cancer. Sharon Begley belonged to the class of gifted writers who have this amazing ability to explain rocket science to a lay reader. Every writer’s dream. Sharing a moving obit penned by her colleagues at STAT on Sharon. R.I.P.
Prompted me to pick up one of her books on a new age problem: compulsion. Sharing the cover photo and two paragraphs from her introduction which make a compelling case for instant purchase.
“Compulsions come from a need so desperate, burning, and tortured it makes us feel like a vessel filling with steam, saturating us with a hot urgency that demands relief. They are an outlet valve, a consequence of anxiety as inevitable as burst pipes are a consequence of water freezing within a building’s plumbing. But while compulsions bring relief, they bring little enjoyment, and while with one part of our brain we desperately wish to stop them, with another we are desperately afraid of stopping.”
“Compulsively checking your smartphone for text messages, stabbing the thing the moment you step out of a dead zone and get a signal; frantically trying to beat a level in a video game; acquiring more and more stuff, no matter how much you already have and how unfulfilled each previous hoard has left you—we feel compelled to engage in these behaviours and more because, if we don’t, we feel the anxiety.”
Sounds familiar? Presume you are hooked by now. If yes, check out the book.
Till we meet again next week. Stay safe.
Excellent piece Anil ! You have not enlisted important lessons learned over last year but have also delineated optimism for future.
Anil, spending on the health sector is a must must for our country, well explained.