Chief Minister Dr Pramod Sawant on September 2 announced that he has tested positive for COVID-19 and that he, being asymptomatic, would be isolating himself at home. The Chief Minister posted this message on his social media handles, much in the manner that other politicians who contracted the virus did. Sawant is not the first of the politicians to test positive for the novel coronavirus. Union Minister Shripad Naik and other MLAs have also been infected by the virus, but in this case the issues if different. Their illness did not affect the administration in any manner. The Chief Minister continues to operate from home, with files sanitised, but there is, however, a worry for the administration, especially since Goa has been seeing a surge in new cases over the past ten days and it needs an administration that is alert to the situation.
In the space of just ten days, Goa’s COVID-19 caseload shot up by almost 5000 to go from 15,027 on August 26 to 19,863 on September 4. The State, on these days, saw daily increases of 497, 456, 523, 547, 451, 414, 588, 636, 713 and then fell to 508. The September 3 increase was the highest that the State has seen since its first case in March this year. During the same ten days, the number of persons who lost their lives to the virus was 65, as the figure of deaths rose from 165 to 220. It is only expected that as cases rise, the deaths will also add to the numbers. While the daily health bulletin makes it a point to state that the deaths have been due to co-morbid conditions of the patients, the question still arises of whether these other underlying conditions of the patients could not have been treated.
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Goa is fighting a real battle against the coronavirus and until now the virus has shown that it has had the upperhand. In the month of August, Goa added 11,505 COVID-19 cases to its tally. It had ended July with 5913 cases and ended August with 17,418. On September 1 the number crossed 18,000, due mainly to the highest single-day spike. In the first four days of September it added 2445. The spread of the virus grew quickly in July but then it accelerated further in the next month, with the administration seemingly uncapable of bringing it down. Except for a few days in August, the daily rise has always been above 250 cases. The actual spread of the coronavirus across all areas in the State has been in August, which makes it all the more important to take extra precautions during this month and for the government to identify the areas that have the most number of cases and isolate them.
With the Chief Minister in home isolation and the Health Services Director in hospital, both having contracted COVID-19, the administration needs to be strengthened to meet the challenges that the month of September is already throwing up especially in containing the coronavirus. If the pace of the spread continues as in August, then Goa could reach 30,000 cases well before the end of this month. It is as sign of hope that the new cases showed a decline on September 4, and it can’t be allowed to increases again, as already the hospital beds in the State are full. Goa needs some strong new measures to keep the cases from increasing, but more important it is the people who need to take precautions. Social distancing is turning out to be most important in keeping the virus at bay. With almost all activity now permitted, it is imperative that the people take care to keep themselves healthy.
