Anticipating Unlock 2.0

Several times now in my town wild terror spread with the news (spread mostly by word of mouth or social media) that one or two local people had died of CoViD 19; every time they turned out to be fake. Noting the panic in people’s voices and eyes, it was evident that even that was no reassurance for them at all: mere mention that a handful of people had been infected was received with the same kind of consternation and dismay as though hundreds had actually died overnight. Again and again I asked people – adults, mind you, supposedly educated adults, too: ‘How many among your family members, neighbours, friends, relatives and colleagues have died of this disease?’ and every time they were forced to admit that the number was zero; when I asked them next whether they knew some among family, neighbours, friends, relatives and colleagues who had died of cancer or in traffic accidents, they all admitted they knew lots of such. When I next asked them ‘So why this kind of terror?’ they all sheepishly dropped their eyes and mumbled incoherently. They had no idea why.

There is some reason to hope now that at long last people at the highest levels of government have begun to realize what terrible damage this mindless panic has caused. I watched the PM’s June 17 message to CMs countrywide on YouTube (see here), and he himself, no less, has stressed certain things that I have been saying right from the beginning: 1) the infection and death toll, given India’s population and population density, have been small and very small respectively, 2) a majority of infected people are recovering, 3) for most infected people, the disease is mild or completely asymptomatic, 4) the stigma and unreasoning fear associated with infection has to be removed, 5) the vast majority of infections have occurred in just a few large cities. I hope that this new campaign, this effort to remove the mindless, blind, completely pointless terror will be given momentum in the days to come. That ought to be the main thrust of Unlock 2.0, as and when it happens. By the time it is successfully done, people should have learnt to live with CoViD as just another not too serious disease, and therefore without unreasoning, all-pervasive panic.

Right now, I cannot say what makes me laugh louder with contempt and despair: people walking around with masks hanging from their ears, as though the very presence of the mask will be enough to save them, wearing not needed, or people driving alone inside air conditioned cars, masks tightly in place. ‘Educated’ people, too. Will I ever be able to treat such educated people as adults again, leave alone respect them?