'Build More Hospitals, Focus On Containment': Anand Mahindra Suggests 4-Pronged Strategy To Beat COVID-19

Industrialist and Chairman of Mahindra Group, Anand Mahindra, took to Twitter to share a series of tweets suggesting a four pronged strategy to beat COVID-19 in India.

The strategy focused on one major goal that should be to continue preventing avoidable deaths. It included:

1. Rapidly build field hospitals equipped with oxygen lines
2. Deploy widespread testing and tracing
3. Focus on containment not through zones but at sub pin code levels
4. Protect the elderly and medically vulnerable

Focusing on the current trend of cases across different states, Anand tweeted, "The number of new cases has risen, despite flattening the previous few days. With higher testing, a continuing rise is inevitable given the low absolute number of cases relative to our population & the rest of the world. We shouldn't expect a swift flattening of the curve."

The industrialist pointed at how the lockdown in India has not been effective and that the low death rate has only been a result of joint efforts of the people of the country.

"India's death rate per million is currently 1.4 compared to the global average at 35 & the US at 228," he tweeted.

Talking about the extension of the lockdown which is expected to end on May 17, Anand wrote, "If the lockdown is extended for a longer period of time, we will be risking economic hara-kiri."

Referring to the importance of a functioning and growing economy, Anand Mahindra said it to be "the immune system for livelihoods" and "a lockdown weakens that immune system and affects the impoverished in our society the most".

Recently, Anand Mahindra also suggested a "comprehensive" lifting of lockdown after 49 days, saying the industrial recovery will be painfully slow if the government opts for "sequential opening" of different parts of the country.

Also Read: India Managed COVID-19 Effectively Early On: WHO Envoy