CORONA-VIRUS PANDEMIC
It was on 22nd
March 2020 when a 24-hour voluntary curfew was observed all over the country at
the instance Prime Minister. It was followed by a 21-day nationwide mandatory
lock down from March 24 onwards. The reason was
the emergence of a new virus termed as invisible and spreading from man
to man and was incurable through existing medical treatment.
The outbreak
of this new virus was made public on 31st December 2019 when China informed the World Health
Organisation about a group pneumonia cases of an unknown cause in Wuhan city in
Hubel province. Quite alarmingly the disease gripped not only some other
provinces of China but also many other countries causing a huge number of
deaths.
The World
Health Organisation (WHO) declared it a pandemic and name the virus as
SARS-COV-2 which is now called as COVID-19.
The Corona
pandemic has upset the normal life of all the countries. It has seriously hurt
their economy because of continuous lock-downs and shutting up of most of the business,
manufacturing, social, academic, hospitality, entertainment, travel,trnsport
and other activities. Work at home and online meetings became the new normal.
Large gatherings became unlawful. Sanitisation, social distancing,
face-masking, became compulsory as a preventive measure.
The only hope
for riddance from this pandemic was the production of effective vaccines.
However, the
pandemic has already affected about 9 crore people globally and killed about 02
crore people. The worst hit nations are: US, India, Brazil, Russia and UK.
China, too, has not been less affected.
Vaccines have
now been created by several countries. Russia is using Sputnik V. U.K. is using
Moderna. U.S.A. is using Pfizer. India will be using Co-Vaxin from January 13. There
are 172 countries in the world. Each of them will be choosing a vaccine according
to its own needs.
A priority
schedule for vaccinating people has been drawn. First: Health and front line
workers; then elderly people with co-morbidities; then people above the age of
50, lastly the remaining people.
The Government
of India has created Co-Win for all sorts of information about the vaccination
programme.
The efficacy
rating of the available vaccines ranged from60-70 to 90 plus.
That the
vaccines will overcome the pandemic quickly and permanently is not assured at
all.
In spite of vaccination
drive, USA, UK, Scotland, Russia, China are having thousands of new cases.
In U.K.
there is a mutant form of the virus which is fast spreading. India has as on 6th
Jan 2021 73 such cases.
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