Where will we reach?

Marooned in Covid19, the law makers are terribly confused. We are sailing to an uncharted territory through a rough sea   

So much has been discussed about the novel Corona virus over five months. Many sharks have stumbled upon it. So much study has been carried out on the character of the virus world over and deployed cutting edge technology to split and analyse the pathogen. Billions have been kept aside for pouring on to the study, ultimately to develop a medicine that would make the drug industry significantly fattier. Several hundred thousand people have already died and millions are recuperating. No one knows how many more will succumb. More than the recovery rate, the number of new victims rises every hour. All have almost lost their counts, seeing it as just an order of the day.

The entire world is on its toe. Virologists around the world haven’t slept since December 2019. Healthcare workers are not sleeping now. Many of them are stumbling over infection on daily basis. The police force is tired and has begun to fall, because of its falling morale. Every business is ailing. Labourers have left their work field and returned to their home, some may perhaps never to retun. Even the most optimists have begun to see uncertainty.

Hectic researches and trials are going on in a typical race. It has become a question of who would bell the cat first. However, everything goes beyond everyone’s prediction. The erratic nature of Corona has perplexed scientists. The variability of the mortality rate and the course of recovery are all the more perplexing. Law makers are groping in dark.    

Meanwhile, the severity of the attack has seemingly reduced, though the contagion still maintains its speed. The over-confident India never anticipated Covid 19 victims’ number to be above 10,000 initially. The number rose sixteen fold in a matter weeks, as a slap on the counting clerk. We haven’t yet seen the curve flattening even at the end of two months long lockdown. Children have lost three months of schooling. Teachers have no job of exam sheet valuation and computation. We have lost heavily in the law makers’ miscalculation. The shadow of fear is gradually waning, though the contagion is still aggressively. The damage will remain a damage, as long as our law makers show their spine in lifting the lockdown.  

People are gradually getting used to it and started coming to terms with the seriousness of the contagion. Is it really a killer virus? Is the Covid 19 really existing that really poses a threat to human life? My answer is, “NO”. Or is it something else? Do we really need to develop a vaccine or can’t we re-profile existing natural solutions which can resist viral and bacterial attacks? My answer is, obviously “YES”.

Why the mortality rate even among co-morbid cases is different? Why is it less in India compared with the cases of western countries where mortality rate is very high? Is it is because of India’s efficient medical system or life style adhering to traditional foods? These questions are subjects of a broad level debate. Touch wood! India’s Covid19 mortality rate is much lower than the rate recorded in the boastful western countries. There may be some specific reasons, which we need to unearth. I hope scientists would work on this promising result sooner than later.

Scientists are also seemingly confused. In many cases, test results are erratic, leaving a room for doubt that non-Covid19 is also counted as Covid19, by mistake, non-standardisation or confusion. In some cases, it is positive in the first test report and soon the same case turns to be negative in second test report. This rapid shift in the test report questions efficiency and reliability of the test, or the method used for it. How does it happen? Is the text kit not fit enough to read the presence of virus in the second case or has the first test report in such cases failed to make correct reading of the test kit? Or, we may have to say the virus becomes inactive in some people so quickly in three days, between the period of first and second tests.

The inconsistency of the Covid19 impact is a matter of big challenge and throws up many questions also. There is also a significant inconsistency in transmission within the family of a victim. In most cases, all the family members of the first victim are not infected. This means, there is a vast difference in the infection level. Doctors may call it a variation in immunity level. But what about the toddlers related to the victims? In many cases, toddlers are tested negative while the mother is tested negative. That obviously means a person with strong immunity is highly resilient to the infection. On the contrary, the infection is considered dreadful. All members of the family are looked at with a stigma of being patients and untouchable.  No one burns his cottage for killing bugs.

There are already evidences that Covid19 patients can be treated at home also, like all other infectious diseases. Barring accidental and suicides, every person dies of one or the other illness even after expensive and high-tech treatments. In normal circumstance, also patients die of various diseases, including viral infections, which may not have killed other patients of same intensity and the same health parameters.  Hospitalisation is required only if the ailment is severe with co-morbidity or if the patient requires life-support. I don’t see Covid 19 vastly different from other viral infections, except the fact that we are excessively afraid of this and our combat operation against this disease is made more dreadful. That leaves a stigma on patients and the location they stay. In this process, the respectable healthcare personnel also have become untouchable. As we have failed in our lockdown strategy, we are seemingly failing miserably in the way we are approaching this disease.

The world, in the recent years, has seen many diseases, both bacterial and viral, with no medicines. The world also has seen diseases haunting humanity for centuries, which were later defeated with the development of vaccines, medicines and self-control. There were diseases, which had changed the equation of empires and dominions. There are diseases, which have medicines and vaccines. Still those diseases kill human beings. Several hundred thousand people die of tuberculosis (TB) every year, despite having effective medicines and vaccination. Therefore, Covid19 even after discovery of medicines and vaccination may not disappear.        

None in the SARS category has medicines so far. Still, the transmission is contained and the disease is managed to some extent. In the case of Covid19 also, despite having no medicine, patients are treated successfully. In the mid-way from quarantine also many suspected are rehabilitated. Its mortality rate is not as high as Ebola or Nipa, or for that matter, the widely common dengue fever or malaria. All these diseases, including the contagious ones, are treated by almost every class of hospitals. That way, every hospital can treat Covid 19 also, if permitted. At the same time, we have classified the hospitals for treatment of Covid19, curtailing the overall capacity of hospitalisation and comfort of patients, especially in densely populated cities. That is one of the finest instances of our preparation failure. A preparation failure also contributes to make the overall situation more glaring and fearful. In Mumbai, there were reports of patients being treated under fly-over after the full-capacity utilisation of a big hospital. Private hospitals have enough facilities, which are remaining idle. They may be ready also for managing the crisis, after all, a hospital is meant for taking in every patient seeking its treatment. 

For the sake of argument, one can say the transmission rate of Covid19 is higher. Yet, there would be no hospital, which could be careless of containing the threat infections they faced. If a hospital can treat a disease, for sure, it is also able of manage the contagion. Though we need to be more cautious, an over-caution throws up only adverse results. Miscalculation naturally sabotages all the plans.

Many of the health workers and police personnel are working under terrible fear. They are helpless but compelled to remain inside their uniform in every inhospitable situation. That has led to the systematic deterioration of their health. As a Managing Director of a Multi-speciality Ayurveda Hospital with doctors having superior talent in service and research set-up, I have made many field visits along with my doctors’ team. Our team has met many police personnel, who are working under a hostile condition and under severe stress. We help them as a part of our social commitment. In Maharashtra, already the number of police personnel under treatment is very high. They are working in a danger zone; so, I believe, it is our duty to support them. They need proper counseling, handholding with supply of medicines and protection of healthcare system.  These can help them resist infections, stay mentally strong and scale down their stress. However, they don’t get any of these. Media has forgotten all these, since, seemingly, such area is commercially not beneficial for them or for their interest. These are all social issues, which our Fourth Estate considers a foreign space. The government is busy correcting comments, balancing counter comments and looking for some ways to survive, as the crisis has reached a bursting point. All are searching for someone to pass the buck and to pull on as long as the foul-show ends. Where will we reach is a question that we have to leave to the Almighty to answer.