[joslicx]

Originally Posted by Turbanator

Good that we agree on few points. Regarding handling of the situation in west, I still feel that they have reacted as the situation demanded instead of locking everything at the word go.

Do you really think anyone in matured economies could have locked down the whole US or UK under curfew when the count was 600? Trump did stopped the flights from China but they had so many infections from Europe. It’s easy to say that lock everything and build infrastructure but this can happen only in countries like ours where commoners have a limited say.

Anyways, its good that a UK citizen feels or at least used to feel safer in India

Your consternation would sound more convincing if the Brits and the Americans hadn't lost so many lives and India so few ( relatively speaking ). Just my two cents.

The lockdown may or may not be the right thing to do, but this is all in hindsight. I don't think any nation right now knows what really is the right strategy to combat the virus. All are trying in their own ways, given their own constraints, resources and geopolitical situations. A real assessment of the efficacy of each strategy still warrants some time, probably few months at least till the virus waves are over and number of new infections reduce to low values.

[srini1785]

^^

The best strategy was issued long time back :

" KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON ".

[Nalin1]

Originally Posted by srini1785

^^

The best strategy was issued long time back :

" KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON ".

I think we can now close this thread with this post.

[am1m]

The phrase 'the new normal' seems to be catching on. Like most people, I took it to mean 'masks, sanitizer and social distancing'. The correct use of those is anyway not happening and very soon will become even more lax. But thinking about it a bit more, I think the new normal is actually assessing how much risk (real or imagined) one is willing to take on a daily basis.

Am I comfortable going to my friend's house, are they ok with letting me come over, call ahead and ask, and not being offended if they say please don't come over. Visiting elderly parents. For example, a friend does not want to venture outside even now because he lives with his grandparents and doesn't want to risk it, whereas, my father-in-law is in his late 80s, but he's perfectly ok with us coming there as soon as the government allows non-essential travel, in fact he's asked us to come as soon as we can. But are we ok with the risk (however minor) of us possibly being asymptomatic carriers.

Am I ok going to this shop, that restaurant, this gym, that park (of course all this is assuming these activities are being permitted by the authorities). Going in to work (assuming I have a choice to work from home). Letting kids go back to school, some will be ok, some will not prefer to.

Different people will have different interpretations of the risk, for example my relatives will be absolutely against me going to Kanteerava Stadium once it opens, but I'm sure they will be the first to go to a temple once those open.

And a lot of people will not be lucky enough to have a choice of course, have to go out to earn a living.

Things like that. I'd say that is the new normal. I don't think there are correct answers. And as long as the law permits it, I hope we don't start getting judgemental about people's choices.

[mohansrides]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

We know each other well enough for me to openly say that this is foolish talk.

In the five months that we have been measuring the fatalities, this virus has killed 0.3 (3 lacs) million people. Although it is highly unlikely, let us say that without a lockdown, the virus would have killed 100 times as many. That is 30 million people. So, we are suppressing economies that feed, clothe and house 7600 million people and perpetuating a fear of the virus that will permanently inhibit populations; all for potentially having saved 30 million people. Now, THAT is foolish.

Cheering loudly for 80 year olds, 90 year olds and 100 year olds who beat Covid after being provided with every facility, while we stand silently by and chalk up the deaths of young and healthy people as collateral damage in this lockdown... Well, that is BEYOND foolish.

Originally Posted by v1p3r

..It also reminds me that during this darkest of hours, there are still good, decent people in this country.

I am very grateful for this.

Don't be thankful for decency. That definition is subjective. If anything be thankful for this - the people who voted for this lockdown will never be rid of their fear. For months, years, or even decades hence, if someone near them so much as sneezes, these people will have sleepless nights for weeks. I suppose there is some justice in this world.

Cheers

[GeneralJazz]

Hundreds gather in Sagar district, MP, to celebrate the arrival of a monk! Lock down, social distancing be damned! Link, link

Amid an inexorable and worrying rise in coronavirus cases in India - the number of COVID-19 cases rose by 3,525 over the past 24 hours, government data showed this morning, hundreds gathered in Madhya Pradesh's Sagar district on Tuesday, in blatant violation of social distancing protocols, to celebrate the arrival of a Jain monk.
Madhya Pradesh is one of the states most badly hit by the novel coronavirus outbreak, with 3,986 confirmed cases and 225 deaths linked to the infectious virus.

We just cant seem to catch a break can we? Every now and then, some incident like these keep happening. So what now? Continue lock downs when the cases spike in a few weeks?

[DigitalOne]

Former UK Supreme Court Judge on the lockdowns

Context of the article is UK. Selected quotes:

States have always tried to confine people known to be carrying dangerous infections. But we live in a new world in which, if we are ill, the State will try to cure us. From this, it is said to follow that the State can take control of our lives against our will even if we are healthy, lest we fall ill and need its services too much.

Suddenly, it is our duty to save the NHS, not the other way round.

What sort of life do we think we are protecting? There is more to life than the avoidance of death. Life is a drink with friends. Life is a crowded football match or a live concert. Life is a family celebration with children and grandchildren. Life is companionship, an arm around one's back, laughter or tears shared at less than two metres. These things are not just optional extras. They are life itself. They are fundamental to our humanity, to our existence as social beings. Of course death is permanent, whereas joy may be temporarily suspended. But the force of that point depends on how temporary it really is.

[poloman]

Originally Posted by mohansrides

In the five months that we have been measuring the fatalities, this virus has killed 0.3 (3 lacs) million people. Although it is highly unlikely, let us say that without a lockdown, the virus would have killed 100 times as many. That is 30 million people. So, we are suppressing economies that feed, clothe and house 7600 million people and perpetuating a fear of the virus that will permanently inhibit populations; all for potentially having saved 30 million people. Now, THAT is foolish.

Cheering loudly for 80 year olds, 90 year olds and 100 year olds who beat Covid after being provided with every facility, while we stand silently by and chalk up the deaths of young and healthy people as collateral damage in this lockdown... Well, that is BEYOND foolish.

Sir please value life irrespective of whether you favor lockdown or not. 30M lives saved is not a big thing? Sad..is only what I can say.
A life is a life whether he is 10 year old or 100 year old. You will also grow old. So please don't put a value on people based on their age. This is so wrong.

[mohansrides]

Originally Posted by DigitalOne

Former UK Supreme Court Judge on the lockdowns

Context of the article is UK. Selected quotes:

Thank you for this. That judge sure knows life.

I was sitting in on my daughter's first grade class conducted online yesterday. All the kids were talking over each other. My daughter herself was shouting above the din; not so much to be heard by the teacher but more to communicate with her friends. She was trying to tell her friends what she had been up to, and no part of that conversation involved school work. Watching her, it was clearly apparent that she was missing her rambunctious classroom environment. On the days that I have visited her school, the buzz of loud classrooms reminded me of my school days and made me smile. During every visit, my wife would talk to harried teachers who were busy trying to peel kids away from each other. But, hassled or not, not one teacher gave us the impression that he or she didn't want to be in that classroom. That's how it should be. Connect, communicate, learn and grow.

Now, just for a second, suspend all the practical arguments for and against masks and envision a society where everyone is walking around with a mask and staying 5 feet away from each other. Is that even living? What kind of dystopia is that?

Think of your son's or daughter's annual class photograph. How would that happen? With every kid wearing a mask and standing 5 feet away from each other? Would that class photo be even worth it? Or think about our famous Team BHP meets with everyone showing up with a mask and sitting 5 feet away.

Our faces are our identities and windows to our souls. Our entire existence as a species is based on being able to connect with one another. Now, we are going to run the other way in our existential journey? Away from each other?

I can't imagine India without our collective experiences - our noisy schools, our wonderful cinema, our brilliant street-food, and our amazing hospitality; each of which is one cog in the wheels of connections that we are all bound by.

I fervently pray that my kids don't grow up learning to disconnect from each other by studying through online classes. I really don't want that for my children. Better a virus than a life of social isolation and fear.

I dare say that it is only people-to-people connections that have prevented large scale man-made catastrophes like nuclear war which can kill exponentially more people than any pathogen. If we now perpetuate a society where the human connections are weakened or even lost, we are opening the doors to situations where one nation won't think twice before obliterating another. If anything, we should be afraid of disconnecting from one another.

Originally Posted by poloman

Sir please value life irrespective of whether you favor lockdown or not. 30M lives saved is not a big thing? Sad..is only what I can say.
A life is a life whether he is 10 year old or 100 year old. You will also grow old. So please don't put a value on people based on their age. This is so wrong.

So, the lives of migrants who are walking home in this dead heat only to die of starvation, or by being mowed down by buses, or trains, or trucks. Aren't those lives? What about the N other lives being lost for not getting access to food or healthcare? Aren't those lives?

Please think about what you are saying. If we set out to save every life by initiating a worldwide lockdown and piling suffering on the vast majority, we would have no one alive in this world. At the end of it, every decision we make is always about numbers. It's not a happy thought I know. But, it is the truth.

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[turbo]

So I guess the lockdown is unofficially extended to the 30th of June, as no trains are going to run before that.

[m8002?]

Reminds of the scene from Damini
Lockdown par Lockdown par Lockdown......

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X67EI1e0H6Y

[mohansrides]

Originally Posted by m8002?

Reminds of the scene from Damini
Lockdown par Lockdown par Lockdown......

OT:

Thanks for a much needed respite. I suspect that the crowd here is too young to remember Damini. Those were the golden days of Sunny Deol and RK Santoshi. And Amrish Puri What does one say about actors like him who have literally breathed life into our villains. Mogembo would look at this lockdown and then laugh at our pitiable state. I can imagine him booming out "Lockdown pe lockdown. Lockdown pe lockdown. Lockdown pe lockdown... yehi tumahari zindagi rahegi neech kameenon", and then breaking into that larger-than-life laughter of his.

Here is another famous dialogue from Damini ("...dhai kilo ka haath..")

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4HViczL_G0

[V.Narayan]

Originally Posted by turbo

So I guess the lockdown is unofficially extended to the 30th of June, as no trains are going to run before that.

The lockdown was meant to be a brake to buy time to prepare to tackle CV19. It was never meant or designed to be the engine that ran the solutions for dealing with CV19. The brake itself has now become the engine. Alas.

[DCEite]

Originally Posted by turbo

So I guess the lockdown is unofficially extended to the 30th of June, as no trains are going to run before that.

Why June 30? It might be September 30 or even late.

The point is that "lockdown" or whatever you want to name it, is here to stay. The only thing that will keep changing will be its characteristics. Perhaps, Metro services will open from Lockdown 4.0, interstate travel will open from lockdown 5.0... schools will open from lockdown 6.0, or malls would open from lockdown 7.0 and then the trains. These all are just examples. I hope you get the drift.

I think for the rest of this year we will have to live with two things: a) Some kind of lockdown (even if its just namesake) and b) Coronavirus.

[The Rationalist]

So now we have come to this, letting 2,50,000 to 11,00,000 children and 12,000 to 50,000 mothers to die due to indirect effects of Covid-19. These deaths are in addition to what’s usually there. If we take a median , India is about to lose 3,00,000 children! Sacrificing the most promosing and our future for what? Feeling extremely numb, as a father who has two kids aged less than 6.

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/l...229-1/fulltext