- The coronavirus is changing the world
AT PENPOINT
There appears to be more debate on whether the country should go into lockdown since Prime Minister Imran Khan ruled it out, than there was before. However, he has left the matter out, leaving the Sindh government, which his opponents control, to go into lockdown, and the Balochistan government, controlled by allies, has gone into a partial lockdown. The two provinces controlled by his party, KP and Punjab, have not gone into lockdown, but have written to the Army for assistance. The Army imposed a lockdown.
These provinces have not gone for a lockdown, but they have not just shut down schools, but also closed shopping malls, so major sources of a lockdown seem in place. Punjab Chief Minister has said that a lockdown has been imposed, but has also said that ‘things will continue.’ The PM has said that he will not impose a lockdown, because of the fact that so many poor people would not be able to reach work. The flip side of a lockdown is to be seen in Sindh, where so many people need exemptions so that food production and processing does not stop.
The cross-purposes seem to be the Punjab government realising that PM Khan had made an error of judgement and tried to palm off such measures as shutting parks as a lockdown. However, PM Khan would like to avoid the kind of restrictions that a lockdown would entail.
A lockdown, like that introduced by China at once in Wuhan, as well as in many other cities, or like those going into force all over Europe, particularly Italy, France and Spain, requires enforcement. Therefore, it is only as good as the enforcers. The first question that governments imposing a lockdown is what are the chances of law enforcers using it as an opportunity to extract money from violators so as to wink at violations. It should also be noted that crimes will have fallen, and with that policemen’s illegal incomes. One or two healthy persons can’t make a difference, can they?
For the time being, what we are facing is a lockdown, a self-quarantine, a self—isolation that will break the chain of transmission on which the coronavirus depends. Many will remember it as the biggest crisis of their lives. Many will not, for they will be dead
Policemen would come down heavily on the virus if they could see it, and even on obviously sick persons sneezing loudly, and would try to arrest them if they could. But getting a restaurant to shut down instead of staying open just a little while longer can’t hurt, can it?
Well, actually it can. The whole point of a lockdown is to break the transmission of the virus from an infected persons to the uninfected. It is the only known way of combating an epidemic. One means of avoiding a lockdown would be to vaccinate all those not affected yet, but as yet there is no vaccine, and thus more basic methods have to be used.
One obstacle to a proper lockdown in large metropolitan areas would be slum areas, especially katchi abaadis. The problem with them is they are already too overcrowded for residents to maintain social distancing, which is the most vital component of any anti-epidemic strategy. It does not help that they are likely to lack clean water or sanitation, making their residents likelier to fall sick. If the sickness was to start spreading in those localities, the fatality figures might show a sudden surge, and the medical services might be overwhelmed even faster than initially. The medical services are going to be overwhelmed, and it isn’t a question of if rather than when.
It may well be true that a lockdown would mean that a lot of poor people would lose their livelihoods, but if there is no lockdown they could fall sick. They inhabit precisely the kind of neighbourhoods which are such a nightmare to public health officials. They are so crowded that not only are people obliged to live almost on top of each other, but if anyone falls ill, the ambulance finds it a problem to get to their homes.
Though death, and the preceding illness, are supposed to be great levellers, it is easier to practise social distancing in the spacious bungalows of the rich than the crowded hovels of the poor. The rich, and even the middleclass, depend on domestic help from the poor, which is why slums have popped next to every elite neighbourhood. If someone in the slums get sick, it only needs for someone who is a domestic help to become a carrier, and the posh locality will also fall victim.
US President Donald Trump indicated something of the frustration that is being felt at the measures that have to be taken to combat the spread of the coronavirus when he tweeted that it had to be ensured that the cure was not worse than the disease. Even before the problem was over, before the period of lockdown was over, politicians are worrying about the economic effects. There does not seem to be enough realisation that if attempts to keep the economy going are made by allowing contact to continue, a lot of people will be too dead to continue to be economic actors.
The package announced by Prime Minister Imran Khan, imitating packages in the West, included cash for both the housebound and businesses. There was no mention of where the money was coming from. The printing presses? It must not be forgotten that the budgeting exercises are beginning about now, and are made doubly difficult for lack of knowledge about the revenue effects.
It is worth remembering that the last global pandemic, the Spanish flu, did not cause as much economic instability even though it had killed as many 50 million people, which is still far more than the number of cases of COVID-19, which had only reached 486,000 by Thursday afternoon, including 117,000 who have recovered. Over 22,000 people had died by then, which is a tragedy, but may not prove much of a spanner in the works.
One loophole left has been that of religious gatherings, especially the regular Friday congregations, apart from congregational payers. It may be noted that the really big congregations are on Fridays, in all mosques, and that is when the chances of a spread are greatest. How exactly social distancing is to be maintained in prayer, where there is so much stress on there being no space between the congregants, and how the lockdown will affect them.
It is not that Mankind is not used to pandemics. But this one has come after a long time, the century since the Spanish flu. Does COVID-19 compare with the bubonic plague? It was similar in that it too resulted in a virulent form of pneumonia, but it is still claiming lives. The biggest and most consequential attack was the Black Death, which decimated Europe in the 14th and 15th centuries, and killed off so many labouring men, that it led to the collapse of the feudal system. It is only if this epidemic leads to the collapse of the system that prevails, that of capitalism, and even it comes to pass, it will remain the subject of debate for a long time. At the moment, all governments and central banks are fighting this fate.
However, that is far in the future. For the time being, what we are facing is a lockdown, a self-quarantine, a self—isolation that will break the chain of transmission on which the coronavirus depends. Many will remember it as the biggest crisis of their lives. Many will not, for they will be dead.
