Each of the questions asked above needs answers. They are not questions like “How are you?” These are life and death questions. And questions about giving the people of Goa services what they have paid for. But there are no answers.
IT’s an ABSOLUTE SHAME!
We have written and spoken enough on how the utter lack of planning, the obvious need to look into glaring acts of alleged corruption where certain decisions which allegedly led to the breakdown in the oxygen supply system coupled with the failure to utilise and augment the tertiary health care system with a network of Primary HealthCare Centres and Urban Health Centres.
Today, we are asking for accountability. We are asking, “WHO PAYS FOR THIS NEGLIGENCE? WHO PAYS FOR THIS FAILURE? WHO PAYS FOR THIS INSENSITIVITY?
Will the ten Congress MLAs who betrayed the people and the mandate and then went and sold themselves, their morals and their conscience to jump ship and join the BJP pay? Will, they offer money as compensation when it really matters to the relatives of those who have died in their constituencies, even as a gesture of seeking forgiveness with folded hands.
And to the people of Goa, we ask. Will, they fall for the lure of monetary benefits if offered by desperate candidates, or will they fall for false promises or will they ask for accountability? Will they hold their MLAs to account? People of Goa have a right to do that. So why don’t they exercise that right.
DO WE DESERVE THIS?
At the end of the day Goans pay taxes as personal tax and all other taxes. During the pandemic, Goans did not have an efficient transport system. They had no taxis to go for tests and vaccinations, and private hospitals looted patients, with ICU rooms costing above Rs 16,000, with rampant violations of DSS rules. Many Goans did not get beds in the Goa Medical College which was under strain and could not provide enough doctors and nurses even though they worked dedicatedly. Patients died waiting for beds and on dirty hospital floors. Stripped off dignity. Do we deserve this?
Let us break down this myth that the overwhelming number of cases are linked to the collapse of the healthcare system. The truth is that there was an infrastructure laid out and planned but there was no system. People make the system, and good governance runs the system effectively. Goa has magnificently displayed that it has none of those.
So here is the myth-busting math. Goa has a population of 1.4 million (2011 census), which a decade later will have increased. The average number of COVID positive cases in April and mid-May ranged between 25,000 to 30,000 cases. Even if you take the peak of 40,000 active cases, the percentage of those affected by the population is approximately 2.2 per cent. If we take a more realistic, even though it may be higher than the mean of 35,000 cases, the affected percentage of COVID patients is approximately 1.9 per cent of the population. And now with less than 20,000 cases, the percentage is even lower.
Why can’t the system care for the sick in times of a pandemic when even during the peak of the crisis, just about 2 per cent of the population at any given point of time are COVID positive?
Does the Goa government want us to believe that its health care system cannot support even under 2 per cent of its population during times of COVID?
An independent and proud State which calls itself the party and tourism capital of the country, cannot even manage health care for 1.9 per cent of its population. It looks as if the entire system has collapsed and chaos is riding on a rogue runaway train with no driver.
WHERE IS THE MONEY FROM DIFFERENT SCHEMES? WHY CAN’T THE FAMILY OF THE DEAD BE COMPENSATED?
And yes. There is money from the Centre that comes from various schemes. In the Union Budget this year, the Centre granted Rs 300 crore to the Goa government for the diamond jubilee celebrations of freedom from Portuguese rule. Why can’t relevant procedures be followed, files moved and a case made out for an urgent diversion of those funds? For what? For giving ex-gratia payments to those who have lost lives. To give jobs to the next of kin. If governments can do it for calamities and terrorist attack victims, why can’t it be done for COVID victims, especially of families that have lost bread earners?
It is the least that one can do considering that when it comes to giving jobs for political benefits, one only has to check how many health and other workers from Valpoi and the Sattari area and the number of medics from the field of Ayurveda who are in GMC. Let there be money in the hands of the grieving and the sick. Does the government know that there are people who need nutritious food, vegetables, fish and vitamins do not have the money power to get these?
This COVID compensation can well be utilised for private health care because government services have collapsed, buying oxygen concentrators or even getting a stranded sick relative back home.
THE GOVT DID NOT CLOSE BORDERS WHEN IT SHOULD HAVE. AND NOW IT IS BUYING MEDICINES & MEDICAL EQUIPMENT DIRECTLY AND IN BULK TO HANDLE THE DISEASE. WHO BENEFITS? THE MEDICINE SUPPLIERS. WHO LOSES? THE PEOPLE OF GOA
Goans were initially baffled why the “come one come all policy” was applied. But who do they strongly point fingers at now? The government, for keeping Goa open to allow casinos to operate. Hundreds and thousands of people arrived after the second wave had hit. There were COVID cases detected at one of the casinos, even staff was affected. But did the show stop? No.
SUPER SPREADER EVENTS
The holding of the civic elections, the lack of checks during major public gatherings like festivals, and the running of all casinos in Goa were events and destinations where attendees became supper spreaders. By the end of April, these super spreading events were one of the big causes for the overall damage.
What is happening now is that the business of medicines, medical equipment, oxygen is literally flourishing as people are dying. What should have happened was the closing of Goa’s borders and the immediate stoppage of super spreader events and activities
Right-thinking Goans across faiths have always resented the very idea of any government, anywhere in India entering their bedrooms and kitchens telling them what they could eat or wear. But Goans are now aghast that when they actually need governance, service and oxygen at their doorstep, they need to look elsewhere, or beg and borrow, if they cannot organise VIP treatment.
We ask again. DO WE DESERVE THIS? WILL WE MAKE BASIC MISTAKES IN WHOM WE SELECT AGAIN?
However, at the very least, Goans now know that if they had an illusion that they had a real government, that illusion has been shattered.
