No Mystery, Top American Pandemic Expert Lists 9 Govt Actions Behind Plummeting Covid Cases in India
19:14, 3 March, 2021YEREVAN, MARCH 3, ARMENPRESS/ PARTNER NEWS: There has been a global puzzlement at how India has managed to dramatically lower the spread of Covid-19 cases and fatality rates over the last few months, with some experts calling it a “mystery”, but American scientist Yaneer Bar-Yam has said credit should go to the government for being able to identify and leverage its strengths to limit the spread of the infection.
Bar-Yam, who specialises in quantitative analysis of pandemics, said underlying factors such as previous successful response efforts in pandemics, less urbanisation that limits travel and rates of community transmission, limited travel and localised tourism were all important in mitigating the impact of Covid-19.
But he pointed out that swift government action of “restricting/regulating movement to increasing public health capacity to meet the increasing demands of the pandemic,” were equally essential as India seems to have done enough to emerge successful in limiting the impact of the virus.
In September last year, India was confirming nearly 1 lakh cases a day, but that figure has dropped to approximately 12,000 as the country has effectively flattened the curve. The case fatality rate has also dropped sharply.
Highlighting steps taken by the government, Bar-Yam said that in particular decisions to impose severe restrictions on travel, stop gatherings, targeted localized lockdowns, school closures, had proven effective in controlling the outbreak. Other major steps like effective public communication, improvements in case identification, rapid ramping of industrial production of masks and other personal protective equipment (PPE) and testing capacity, have also contributed, he added.
Bar-Yam said that India’s success showed that time and travel are key to controlling pandemics. “The message to go out from India therefore is ‘restrict travel in areas wherein cases are there, isolate cases and don’t allow them to transmit infection’,” he wrote.
In a paper published on his website endcoronavirus.org, he listed the nine major government actions because of which India had managed to tame the infection as well as it has:
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