16th Apr 2021 11:04:PM Editorials
Eastern Sentinel Arunachal News

For the Covid fightback policy makers of the country it’s time now to contemplate deeply what went wrong and why the sense of desperation has doubled that of 2020. The figures will tell everything of the present and also carry the message of shape of things to come. A week earlier, a caveat was issued that the coming four weeks will be extremely crucial. Actually it has turned out to be disastrous on the 2nd week itself and for two successive days, 2 lakh+ has been the new daily caseloads. At 8 am in the morning on Friday, daily Covid data released by the Union Health Ministry said that a total of 2,17,353 new infections has been added over the last 24 hours along with 1,185 fatalities. Covid has been most powerful in the ‘centre of power’, the national capital as it has surpassed Mumbai to become the worst-affected Covid city in the country. The country has already stepped in a season of breaking records and very soon a competition is going to be staged between the states/UTs over the number of daily cases and deaths. Meanwhile, amid the controversy whether there is a real shortage of vaccine stock or the uproar is just a fallout of the politicizing manoeuvres of the opposition, the decision to ramp up production that came on Friday evening is actually an admission in an round-about way that it’s really so. The citizen’s question that will accompany invariably is why a mechanism that would logically address the future Covid vaccine needs was not in place and why the daily caseloads will have to cross the 2 lakh + mark to give way to ‘realizations’.
The Department of Biotechnology has announced that production of the indigenously developed vaccine Covaxin will be ramped up significantly and increased to 10 crore doses per month by September. Lauding the move though, it will be a reasonable assumption that such measure wouldn’t had arrived sans the recent surge which has broken all records. Coming under the lenses next will be the queer policy of exporting and even gifting stocks of vaccines to the world at a time when even the most productive nations in terms of vaccine manufacturing had treaded the conservative path- home first, rest of world next. The import of Sputnik V from Russia has been rendered compulsory and as per reports, stocks to cover 125 million people will be purchased. Arunachal must make sure that there’s no shortage of vaccines and place requisition at appropriate times beforehand to replenish the stock.
One might wonder, how many more ‘shocks’ will the country need to think rationally. Realizations are coming, but aren’t they rather late?


Kenter Joya Riba

(Managing Editor)
      She is a graduate in Science with post graduation in Sociology from University of Pune. She has been in the media industry for nearly a decade. Before turning to print business, she has been associated with radio and television.
Email: kenterjoyaz@easternsentinel.in / editoreasternsentinel@gmail.com
Phone: 0360-2212313

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