Addressing an audience at the Bennett University’s global online conference, the subject of which was COVID -19 Fallout & Future, The Union Health and family welfare Minister, Dr, Harsh Vardhan complimented the Indian Government on the swift and firm action taken to curb and restrain the pandemic. He said that early action was taken in India unlike the other countries which had gone a long way to minimise the severity of the outbreak as compared to other countries.
He said that several measures combined such as including active screening, upgrading of the health infrastructure, surveillance of the community, enhancing the capacity of the ASHA workers have all contributed jointly towards controlling the spread of the infection.
( Image source: Instagram )
He mentioned that an action plan to tackle heath emergencies had already been prepared in January this year. The government had started screening patients with a travel history and noting their whereabouts and tracing them.
Dr. Harsh Vardhan went on to add that in the absence of any cure so far for this deadly disease, social distancing and the lock down measures as practised in India were very effective and would prove to be very helpful. He was hopeful that India would not experience the worst as the other countries did and an addition in medical aid by way of 48,000 ventilators was already underway to help support the country in case of medical emergencies.
On the flip side a mention of the economic effect was made by Dr. Virmani former Chief Economic Advisor. He said that we stood at 2.8 % of the GDP as an effect of the lockdown that we were experiencing currently. He went on to add that if this continued till end April then it would increase further to 5 % and till end May it would stand at 9%.
