Penalty or not, keep masks on
The pandemic is unpredictable and protection is only temporary. Continued vigilance is key
Alittle over two years after India went into one of the strictest lockdowns anywhere in the world to stop the coronavirus from spreading, the country began rolling back the last vestiges of pandemic restrictions on April 1. The most significant among these are mandates and fines relating to the use of masks, perhaps the strongest symbol of the pandemic. Regions such as Delhi and Maharashtra announced that masks will either no longer be mandatory or the fine for not wearing them will be dropped. Behind their decision was a significant legal change that came into force on Friday, when sections of India’s disaster management law meant to give the central government the authority to make and enforce pandemic-related rules expired. As orders invoked under provisions of the Disaster Management Act expired, Covid-19 ceased, for all legal purposes, being a disaster in India.
For all practical purposes, Covid-19 stopped being a threat when India’s third nationwide wave of infections tapered off in early February. Three waves and 1.84 billion vaccine doses have now left Indians with a wall of immunity that has halted the SarsCoV-2’s ability to sicken more people. This is why India’s reopening has not coincided with an uptick in new infections, as has been the case in several other countries, most notably the United States and the United Kingdom. The protection has not been without debilitating costs: India has lost over 520,000 lives to the virus, and the actual death toll may be in millions. For much of the last two years, the virus led to an unprecedented erosion of wealth and earnings, and stopped the clock on the educational (and often social and psychological) development of millions of children.
As people settle into routines reminiscent of 2019, albeit with “new normals” such as hybrid working and (virtually redundant) temperature checks, the triumphs of the last two years must also be tempered by the one key lesson the virus taught us: The pandemic is unpredictable. True, the degree of vaccine coverage is widespread, but the protection from it is only temporary. Moreover, the virus may yet pack more evolutionary surprises. These two factors alone make a compelling case to remember that 2022 can never be 2019. And for that, it may well be worth keeping one of the pandemic’s most significant symbols — the mask — on, akin to how many east Asian societies made those part of their daily routines following the 2002 Sars and
2006 bird flu outbreaks.