COVID-19 infects world economy, will push India few years back!

With the Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressing the nation for the second time in a week locking down the entire nation for 21 days to control the possible spread of Coronavirus, India has joined many of its European counterparts in shutting down the entire nation fearing deadly virus and its devastating impact on its citizen.

Though India has not yet entered the third stage of the pandemic (thankfully), which is the community spreading stage, the measures such as restricting people to stay at home, will, to a great extent, help in containing the virus infecting millions of people in India.

With the country being the second most populous after China, the impact can be devastating and nothing can be said as of now whether the lock down will be effective in stopping the spread of virus and containing the causalities.

Like Italy, Iran, Spain and France, if there is a sudden spike of positive cases in India in the coming weeks, then the impact may be disastrous looking at the fragile, not-so-developed and overstretched healthcare system in India. Due to high population density in urban clusters and high number of uneducated rural households, the virus can infect millions within a few days. So, the lock-down can break the spreading chain.

But what happen after 21 days? If the travel restriction goes, people coming from outside can still infect people. Huge crowd can be seen in railway stations, bus terminus, temple festivals or social functions. Unless there some effective vaccine or cure is at sight, we can’t say for sure, whether the lock-down should be lifted after April 15.

Another important aspect is that, with offices and industries of non-essential goods closing the shutters around the country, the economy is the worst hit, and will take some years for India to come back to the present stage.

Stock market is bleeding, taking the cue from international markets and also domestic scenarios as thousands of crores have been vanished within a week. Rupee value too breached all time high making imports vulnerable. Several key industries have stopped production in their crucial third quarter of the fiscal.

Not only in India, entire world economy has been in jeopardy owing to the novel virus. As our prime minister stated in his address, if we don’t follow the government’s instruction to stay put at homes, our generation will be pushed back to 21 years and the impact will be devastating on several families.

For the world economy, it’s already been infected heavily by Coronavirus. It will surely take few years for the nations to come back to the stage where they are today, and India is not an exception to this situation.

So, without thinking about scientific aspects involved in social distancing to contain the virus, people should be indoors for some days, self-quarantining for the sake of their own health, elders and children in their families and also for the fellow countrymen. By doing this, we can win the race against the deadly virus which has threatened the very existence of humanity.