(Image source from: science.thewire.in)

While the entire world was struggling with the unforeseen pandemic taking a drastic toll on the country, India acted fast to help stagger the growth in the number of cases. The authorities acted swiftly and impose immediate lockdown, putting over 1.3 billion people under a complete lockdown.

They not just halted all the public transport but also stopped international and domestic flight movements and railways as well. The authorities also worked to stockpile all the medical gear that were in need of.

The one fear that the Indian authorities had was if the Covid-19 spread in the slums, controlling the spread would become extremely difficult. They expected that the toll could be get worse than what was witnessed in some of the European countries.

But, around five weeks into the lockdown, the country has been witnessing a slower rate in the mortality in the entire country because of varying reasons and factors. The funeral directors and the ambulance drivers in the country were overwhelmed. Majority of such facilities have reported a less crowd, which was quite astonishing.

India has reported over 27,000 confirmed cases and over 900 deaths. The one roadblock that they entire country has been facing is the lack of testing kits availability.

While the lockdown is one factor playing a crucial role in the control of the spread of the coronavirus in India, there has been other theories that further explain how that could be possible. One such study suggests that the BCD vaccine which is administered at birth for Tuberculosis could play a crucial role in improving immunity.

Some other theories believe that the high heat and humidity could kill or at least prevent rapid growth of the virus.

Some of the workers in the funeral services have reported that the lesser crowd for such services prove for a fact that the condition could have gone the other way if the necessary precautions like the lockdown were not imposed on time.

And the unique factor amidst this is that the mortality rate is not associated with Covid-19. The funeral services owners, who used to receive 20 services in a day now say that the same has come down to 2-3 now.

This provides with a bigger picture that since people are not on the roads and since there has been an imposed lockdown, the same is affecting the mortality rate in individuals. There are reported cases of heart attack and deaths but even that has become a lot less over the course of days.

According to the data collected by the government in 2018, 150,000 deaths were reported in India because of road accidents. US, which has more car ownership per capita, reported just 36,000 deaths. The difference is quite drastic.

Even in the Covid-19 epicenter of India, Maharashtra experiences around 8 deaths per day on the commuter trains. With the halt in operation of the Indian railways, those death counts have gone down as well. Aside from that, Mumbai even reported a 20% reduction in the Covid-19 mortality in comparison to March.

There are chances of deaths that have happened at home and which haven’t been reported yet. But, on a bigger scale, the mortality rate in India has drastically dropped now when the entire nation is under a lockdown till May 03.

By Somapika Dutta