The COVID-19 outbreak in India is in its third week, the critical week as per medical practitioners, and India has ramped up its testing and quarantine capacity. Despite the measures of the government to contain the outbreak, the people have negligently disobeyed the authorities. Member of Parliament, on Monday, tweeted a solution for the same.
India is heading towards a complete lockdown as it announced a complete lockdown of 80 districts across the country already. The testing centers have been increased and so is the quarantine capacity. As people were shifted to quarantine, a period of isolation, reports emerged that many escaped from quarantine centers. The police later had to bring them back. A section of people hid their travel history and symptoms to evade the officials. There were also cases of people popping paracetamol right before thermal screening at airports too, once again, evade the formalities.
This kind of mentality has become a hurdle for the authorities in their effort to contain the pandemic. While, on the surface, it looks outright funny, these incidents might bring down the morale of the medical professionals who are valiantly at the forefront of this battle against the faceless enemy.
Stay Safe or Go to Jail
Irked by the behavior of certain patients, a cricketer turned politician Gautham Gambhir took to Twitter offering a solution to tackle the issue. Gambhir proposed that those who don’t abide and be under quarantine should be sent to jail. ‘Quarantine or Jail’ he tweeted. Further, he acknowledges the efforts of the country and requested people to come together in the fight.
Earlier today, Prime Minister Modi too expressed his displeasure over the negligent actions of people. On Sunday, while people observed ‘Janata Curfew’ by staying indoors, a section of people was in a celebratory mood. Misinterpreting the message of Prime Minister, large crowds assembled together violating the social distancing and clapped, banged plates and rang bells to show their gratitude to the people who at the forefront. Videos that went viral of similar incidents had the nation cringing.
From Tuesday, India will be locking down 80 of its districts in a drastic step towards containing the spread of the novel coronavirus. All the 80 districts have so far reported positive cases of the virus.
