India Coronavirus Dispatch: Many take loans to buy food as incomes dip

 

People in areas like UP’s Sonbhadra district have been skipping meals to compensate for the extreme decline in incomes since the coronavirus pandemic hit. Many of them are availing loans just to be able to buy food. These families were among those surveyed to find out the impact of lockdowns and the relief, if any, they got from the government’s stimulus package. About 68 per cent of the respondents have reported a fall in their incomes. Economic distress, the report says, has become a reality across states and sectors. Farmers are complaining about low prices and markets being shut, while shipowners rue slowing businesses and daily wage earners say they haven’t had any income in months. About 20 per cent of the respondents said they had to resort to selling durables so they could afford food.

By April-end, Kerala had only a couple of dozen active cases and barely 500 new cases since 30 January. The state had claimed to have flattened the curve even while the rest of the country was seeing a steady surge in cases. On September 1, however, Kerala had 76,525 confirmed cases, 31% of which are active. The proportion of active cases is higher than that seen in Maharashtra. Among the major reasons for this ‘new spurt’ is the fact that the state has ramped up testing by large numbers. Secondly, most of the cases early on in the pandemic were those with travel history and their primary contacts. By September, travel history cases accounted for only 19 per cent of the total cases as the pandemic shifted largely to local transmission mode. Another phenomenon the state has seen is of cluster transmissions. Further, Kerala’s famed grassroots level administration lowered its guard even as the pandemic marched forward. Read More