Covid-19 Containment Plan is a Welcome Document but Detailed Plan of Managing Economic Effects of Pandemic Control Urgently Required: Yogendra Yadav, President, Swaraj India

Delhi, 20th April, 2020: Swaraj India welcomes the Containment Plan for Large Outbreaks of CoVID-19 released by Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Govt of India. The plan with defined strategies is reassuring to the citizenry. The vital issue of risks faced by healthcare workers and ways to deal with them is well documented in the section on Infection Prevention Control Practices. However, elaboration on functioning of Infection Prevention Committees (IPC) in hospitals and availability of PPEs, masks and gloves would have been further reassuring.

CoVID-19 pandemic has taken a huge toll on the economically weaker and marginalised sections of Indian society. We have already seen more than 77 deaths due to lockdown. As economists have been pointing out, this is not a matter of choice between pandemic control and economy. A mismanagement on the economy front can be disastrous and lead to a huge loss of lives and collapse of systems. Swaraj India demands that the Ministry of Finance must come up with a detailed plan on managing economic effects of pandemic control measures.