Kerala keeps fingers crossed as Onam festival makes markets live

With the onset of Onam festival season and the relaxation of lockdown, Kerala is keeping fingers crossed as health experts already projected that the daily fresh Covid-19 cases, which is now below 2,500, may go up to 10,000 by next month.

Most shops and commercial streets across the state have already started witnessing almost normal rush. Though the government prescribed strict social distancing norms like the number of persons in shops at a time, those were being followed more in the breach.

For latest updates and live news on coronavirus, click here

Police enforcement has also lost its fizz as the cases were mounting alarmingly and many police personnel involved in Covid-19 containment activities got infected.

Apart from the existing restrictions, the government also decided to allow inter-district public transport services from Thursday in view of the Onam festival season.

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan also said the situation was alarming and the people need to be very cautious in following social distancing norms.

The government has already imposed restrictions on Onam gatherings and celebrations. Even flowers from other states for making floral carpet were restricted. A major chunk of flowers for floral carpet in Kerala used to be brought from Tamilnadu.

CORONAVIRUS SPECIAL COVERAGE ONLY ON DH

A representative of a leading ready-made dress material retain chain showroom in Thiruvananthapuram city said compared to the previous Onam seasons, sales were hardly 25% this time. However, even that 25% is really worth for the shops at this time of the pandemic.

Kerala Health Minister K K Shailaja and head of state government's experts' committee on Covid-19 Dr B Ekbal had recently stated that the state would witness further spike in Covid.

The Indian Medical Association, Kerala chapter, also raised a high alert on the chances of Covid-19 spike during the season. The crowd at shops and markets were posing a high risk of Covid spike in Kerala. Unless utmost care was taken to avert a spike, the situations would go beyond control and consequences would be alarming, said IMA state secretary Dr P Gopikumar.

Though Kerala witnessed the people abiding by the lockdown norms during the initial weeks of lockdown down, once the norms were relaxed the situations seemed to have gone beyond control. Spread of Covid-19 through the local transmission that was around 10% till July first week later witnessed a spurt and now it is around 75%.

A section of health activists feels that the government was now more concerned about the revenue fall it suffered during the lockdown and hence it was now opening up the markets, despite alerts of Covid-19 spike.

At least stringent enforcement of social distancing norms at shops and markets need to be ensured to keep things under control.