What can be done in a Pandemic?


A new word that can be heard from everyone is ‘social-distancing’. Everyone is talking about it, even the NDMA has suggested social distancing in its guidelines. The NDMA is working day and night and it is safe to say that social distancing is the need of the hour right now but is staying at home the only thing that will stop the spread of this virus. Other than this, the need of the hour is being aware of a threat of this kind and being prepared on it. If we look at the Budget 2020-21, approximately Rs. 30 lakh crores are being invested for the military development and in comparison, healthcare & research is just a mere Rs. 69 thousand crores8. Healthcare is being treated rather negligently. Covid-19 pandemic will be gone at its own time because history shows that every virus has a lifeline which we can see in the case of Swine-flu, Nipa virus, Ebola, etc. These viruses came and wreaked havoc and then left, it won’t be wrong to say that we are very lucky that the covid-19 virus is curable because of the patient’s strong immunity. Disaster Management does not mean that in the event of a disaster some steps should be taken after it has struck, it should also include preparation. We are well aware that all countries are prepared to fight back if there is a full-blown nuclear war then why is no one prepared for a flu-virus that can kill more people than a war? One may think that it will be impossible to prepare as one cannot foresee the kind of virus and its characteristics beforehand. This shouldn’t prevent us from working for the future because one thing is for sure that time is not in our favor. Some proposed improvements can be:

  1. Strong Health System – A strong health system is very favorable when it comes to tackling a health emergency, with some extra funding the health system can drastically improve and aid patients. This can be seen in the case of Turkey, whose strong health system has shown a positive clinical result in fighting the virus and the curve is flattening.
  1. Medical Research Corp. – Just like the army in the event of an outbreak experts can be deployed in the epicenter or the ground zero to start dealing with the situation and control it.
  2. Running Simulations – Another improvement that can be made to give a better insight in Disaster Management is running a simulation when there is an event of a disaster to get understanding of the intensity and to be prepared for it. It is also popularly known as “Germ-Games”. If a simulation such as this was made then the management technique could have been improved. All factors such as people’s reaction, behavior and attitude towards the virus could have been taken into consideration through this simulation method to improve management. At the moment the biggest threat that can increase the curve is people’s patience. A simulation using small pox was tested in USA in the year 2001 where the results showed that US was unable to tackle it and it led to a lot of deaths.
  3. Stronger Research & Development – A strong R&D can be favorable for disaster management which are fully equipped with necessary instruments that will contribute in researching for a cure and understanding the behavior of the virus.
    These are some of the suggestions that are being proposed worldwide and what should be done in India as well. We need to have a defense system when it comes to health emergencies for proper management. An outbreak is going to create much more risk to life than any war. The death toll of the Second World War was 75 million people9, on the other hand the 1918 pandemic, popularly known as the Spanish Flu, claimed 50 million lives10 worldwide where 12 million to 13 million deaths11 occurred in India. It is important to remember that a war can always be negotiated and settled whereas negotiating with an invisible virus is impossible.