Experts question TN CM's statement that COVID-19 cases will come down in 3 days

At a time when the entire country is bracing itself to fight the pandemic, Tamil Nadu and its capital Chennai were busy in its own way. Thursday was a day of busy political activities in the state amid the pandemic. While the opposition leader M.K. Stalin sat in front of his desktop to call the DMK’s alliance party leaders, Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palanisami, flanked by his cabinet colleagues, was busy hearing the district collectors through video conference. The collectors briefed him on the COVID-19 situation in each district and discussed the second lockdown. While the opposition’s all-party meeting through video conference had demands placed before the state and Central government, the chief minister’s meeting gave hopes to the people of Tamil Nadu that the state will soon come out of the pandemic. More than this, the meeting had raised expectations on various announcements by the state government to contain the spread of COVID-19 and also on how his government is prepared to handle the lockdown extension.

As expected, Palanisami took to highlight that the number of positive cases in the state was steadily coming down in the past three days. Stating that the state recorded 15 deaths and 180 recoveries till Thursday, it was EPS’s turn to say that the numbers were coming down. Incidentally, Health secretary Beela Rajesh, Chief Secretary K. Shanmugam and health minister Dr C. VijayaBhaskar were the ones who used to share the numbers during the media briefing all these days. He said the state had recorded 25 new COVID-19 cases, making the total number go up to 1267 cases. “Slowly, it will start coming down. We have done extensive contact tracing and we are testing everyone with symptoms. In the next two to three days, it will become zero.”

Apparently, the chief minister’s statement came as a ray of hope to the people who are bracing for the lockdown extension. However, epidemiologists and health experts question as to how the chief minister can be sure in giving out a deadline to say that there will be no positive cases. In fact, according to the media bulletin given out by the health department on April 15, the number of COVID-19 suspected individuals in isolation ward admission was 1,876. This has increased to 1,882 on April 16, according to the government’s media bulletin.

If the number has to come down to zero, all the 1,882 suspected individuals in the isolation wards will have to test negative in the next two to three days. Again, Tamil Nadu has till now tested only 26,005 samples out of which 1,242 has turned positive. Also, as per the data released by the Central government out of the 170 hotspots declared, 22 are in Tamil Nadu. “The chief minister’s statement on Thursday saying the number of cases will come down to zero in the next two to three days is his hope and aspiration to boost the morale of the people. I don’t think it is based on any scientific evidence. For instance, Kerala reported one positive case on one day and eight cases the next day. I feel EPS’s statement was to upstage the opposition leader because he called for an all-party meeting,” says Sumanth Raman, a physician and a political observer in the state.

Incidentally, when the chief minister is highly hopeful that the numbers will turn zero soon, the state is bracing to procure rapid test kits and make available a sufficient quantity of PPEs, masks and gloves for the doctors and the required drugs to fight COVID-19. The chief minister himself said that the state had placed orders and has 1,95,000 RT PCR kits to increase the number of testing. Also, the state has been bracing up to set up special isolation wards. Recently, the sprawling World Trade Centre at Nandambakkam in Chennai was converted into an isolation centre, with several hundreds of cubicles as isolation wards. Also, the state has placed orders for 2,000 more ventilators in addition to the existing 3,371 ventilators to fight the pandemic.

“Reaching zero is not very easy. It is surprising to hear the chief minister say this. We cannot actually say that by bringing down the number, there will be zero positive cases. Wuhan in China, which was the epicentre, is now witnessing a second attack. The chief minister’s statement is disappointing,” says Dr G.R. Ravindranath, of DASE (Doctors Association for Social Equality). It may be recalled that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, on April 14, in his televised address, asked the people to brace themselves and said the lockdown will continue till May 3. The prime minister, of course, did not make any promises on bringing down the number despite the infrastructure available with the Centre. Probably, the prime minister knew that any such mention will only cause further trouble. Chief Minister Palanisami, who had been a staunch follower of the prime minister since the demise of his late leader Jayalalithaa, might soon understand why Modi did not commit on any number.