'...Having the Aarogya Setu tracking app on your phone is now a condition for millions of workers in India to enter office premises, work from home, register attendance, and in some cases, be paid salaries. Some managers are even insisting that employees’ family members get the app... It was launched as a voluntary app, but the number of people who aren’t required to use it today is fast shrinking. India is now the only democracy to make its tracking app mandatory for people outside containment zones...'
'Last week, The New Indian Express, one of India’s major English newspapers, pulled down an article that was heavily critical of the Centre’s response to the COVID-19 outbreak. The article, entitled ‘Centre’s COVID-19 Communication Plan: hold back data, gag agencies and scientists’, discussed the government’s reluctance to share outbreak-related data and attempts to muzzle scientists.
'Mohammad Ayub (name changed), a 46-year-old resident of Raopura in Vadodara, Gujarat, has been undergoing dialysis three times a week for the past two years. Once a mechanic, he used to earn his living by repairing air conditioners and refrigerators. Ayub has now been confined to his home after kidney failure close to two years ago. A month ago, Tricolour Hospital, where Ayub had been undergoing treatment for the past two years, refused to treat him further. “The hospital authorities told me that I should get tested (for COVID-19) as the area I reside in was declared a red zone.
'The number of coronavirus casualties reported by Lok Nayak Hospital, Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital, Lady Hardinge Medical College and the Delhi and Jhajjar centres of AIIMS stands at 116, according to data from these hospitals and confirmed by their officials to The Indian Express. This is higher than the Delhi government’s official Covid-19 death toll, which stood at 66 until Thursday night. According to the Delhi government’s daily bulletin, a total of 33 deaths have been recorded from these specific hospitals...'
'As many as 103 people, including inmates and staffers, at Arthur Road Central Jail tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday. The prison, known for having housed underworld figures and terror convicts, currently houses around 2,800 inmates despite having a capacity of 800. A team of doctors from the JJ Hospital had on Tuesday collected samples from around 200 people at the prison, after the virus was observed to have reached one of the barracks at the jail. Test reports came in on Thursday evening...'
'In most developing countries, including India, the quality of data on the cause of death is very poor. This is because most people die in rural areas and at home, a medically certified death in a hospital is rare, and medical certificates more often than not are filled incorrectly. Dr Prabhat Jha, founding director of the Centre for Global Health Research in Toronto, is one of the world’s leading experts on mortality in India. He is a professor of disease control and an expert advisor to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation as well as various governments...'
'One night in lockdown this April, George Kuruvilla was having dinner and watching the news when he fielded a phone call from a prospective supplier who talked up a tracking-wristband and accompanying software to ensure possible COVID-19 patients don’t violate their quarantine. What followed offers an illuminating insight into how India’s tech companies are turning India into a surveillance state one sales pitch at a time.
'There could not be a clearer indication of how bad the coronavirus crisis is going to get for Mumbai. On Monday, the 40th day of lockdown, the BMC was working feverishly to add new isolation beds, especially in the worst effected south-central Mumbai. Soon, one of Mumbai’s prettiest open spaces, the Mahalaxmi Racecourse will have a 200-bed isolation facility in its vast parking lot.
'It is a lonely Ramzan for 48-year-old Abdul Bari in Delhi. While his wife and four children tested positive for COVID-19 and are receiving treatment in hospitals in Delhi, he wished he would be able to spend time with his two kids, 13-year-old Zahra and 12-year-old Arshad Jamal, who tested negative at the Dwarka quaratine centre. "Both tested negative in their first test on 4 April and then the second one on 14 April. The 14 days of quarantine ended two weeks ago, it is over a month today. I do not even know who I can call and ask about them.
'The number of official Covid deaths in Malegaon in Maharashtra is just 12 since the first case in early April but, overall, the number of deaths in this city has shown an unusual surge. At 580 deaths for April, as per civic records obtained by The Indian Express, it’s almost twice the figure for the same month last year (277) and a 48 per cent jump over the number of deaths in March this year (see chart).
