Coronavirus: South Asia keeps its fingers crossed

A research scholar at an institute in Wuhan in central China returned to his home in Nepal on January 9 to spend the Lunar New Year holiday with his family. The coronavirus had by then arrived in the “Chicago of China” but had not yet started its macabre dance of death. Dr Li Wenliang of Wuhan Central Hospital had blown the whistle on WeChat, but Chinese authorities had pounced on him and made him admit that he had just been spreading rumours.

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The Nepalese scholar did not know that the virus had claimed its first known victim in Wuhan the day he reached his home in Kathmandu. A 61-year-old died at the hospital, but China made his death public only on January 11. The deceased was found to have been a regular at the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan – the “ground zero” of what would later turn into a pandemic. The 32-year-old Nepalese turned up at the Sukraraj Tropical and Infectious Disease Hospital in Kathmandu on January 13, with fever, cough and respiratory problems. He was admitted, cured and discharged on January 17. He was put in quarantine at home, though. His throat swab was sent to a lab in Hong Kong and, on January 24, the same was found to be Covid-19 positive – making him the first known case of infection by the virus not only in Nepal but in all of South Asia.

A 43-year-old tourist developed Covid-19 symptoms when she was about to leave for her home at Hubei in China on January 26 after a week-long tour of Sri Lanka. Hers was the first case in the Indian Ocean island nation. India reported its first case on January 30 – a student who had returned home in Kerala from Wuhan recently following news of the coronavirus outbreak.

So, for three of the eight South Asian countries -- Nepal, Sri Lanka and India -- the first Covid-19 cases were all linked to the epicentre of the outbreak in China.

Afghanistan and Pakistan, however, got it from Iran – one of the worst affected countries outside China. A 35-year-old man was the first patient in Afghanistan. He tested positive on February 24, a few days after returning home in Herat from Qom in neighbouring Iran. Pakistan reported its first case on February 26, when a student at the University of Karachi tested positive. He had also recently returned from Iran.

The remaining three South Asian nations – Bhutan, Maldives and Bangladesh – reported their first cases between March 6 and 8. A tourist from the United States was the first Covid-19 patient in Bhutan. He tested positive on March 6. Two employees of a resort at Kuredhoo Island in Maldives were found to be infected on March 7. They apparently got it from an Italian, who had tested positive after returning home after a vacation in the archipelago. Two men and a woman, who tested positive on March 8, were the first cases in Bangladesh. They had recently returned from Italy.

Thus, in about 45 days from the time the first case was reported in Nepal, the coronavirus had spread its tentacles across South Asia – home to 21% of the global population.

The virus has so far infected at least 24,836 people in the region’s eight countries, and 735 have died of it, according to the ‘Situation Report’ of the SAARC Disaster Management Centre in Ahmedabad (as of 11 am, April 18). The region registered a mortality rate of less than 3%, while the global average is close to 7%.

India, of course, leads the tally with a total of 14378 Covid-19-positive patients and a death toll of 480. Pakistan follows with 7,481 patients and 143 deaths. The mortality rate has been higher in India (over 3%) than in Pakistan (nearly 2%).

Also Read: Coronavirus India update: State-wise total number of confirmed cases, deaths

Bangladesh and Afghanistan rank third and fourth with 1838 and 845 infected people and 75 and 30 deaths, respectively. Sri Lanka has recorded 244 cases and seven deaths. Maldives, Nepal and Bhutan have just 29, 16 and five patients, respectively, and no deaths due to the virus so far.

All the South Asian nations responded to the outbreak by banning international and domestic flight arrivals, closing land borders, and imposing restrictions on travel within their territories and, later, lockdowns.

India imposed country-wide lockdown on March 24, which continues till May 3, but with some relaxation post-April 20. Nepal, too, enforced nationwide lockdown on March 24 and has extended it till April 27. Bhutan imposed a lockdown on April 1 till April 21. Bangladesh extended its lockdown to April 25. Sri Lanka and Maldives responded with partial lockdowns. Maldives, however, is now mulling a complete lockdown, after detection of a few more Covid-19 cases in the country this week.

Unlike India, Pakistan did not evacuate its nationals studying in Wuhan, perhaps more to avoid offending its “iron brother”, than to avoid the risk of the outbreak. Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government, however, completely failed to manage the hundreds of pilgrims returning home from Iran. They were “quarantined” in a squalid camp at Taftan in Baluchistan after they crossed the Iran-Pakistan border. They were not screened or tested for Covid-19. Neither were the ones with Covid-19 symptoms segregated from others. When they were returned to the provinces they belonged to a couple of weeks later and were tested, nearly 600 of them were found infected.

Pakistan has extended its lockdown to April 30, but its implementation has not been effective. Khan himself is trying to convince a group of clerics who have been opposing the order of the government to avoid large congregation during prayers on Fridays and are also not keen to abide by any such restrictions during Ramzan.

The returnees from Iran and Pakistan contributed to the rise of Covid-19 infection in Afghanistan, too. The Afghan government’s response to Covid-19 was somewhat stymied by the tussle between President Ashraf Ghani and his rival Abdullah Abdullah, who too staked claim to the top office in Kabul. The enforcement of the lockdown has varied from province to province. The Taliban, which is pursuing a peace process with the Afghan government, however, agreed to help healthcare professionals to fight the outbreak. But the country’s lack of testing kits and healthcare infrastructure as well as the continuing fight between security forces and militants have made the fight against the pandemic all the more difficult.

The pandemic and the lockdowns imposed to contain it have prompted the World Bank to revise the growth forecast for South Asian economies for 2020 from 6.3% to somewhere between 1.8% and 2.8% – signalling the worst slowdown in the region in almost four decades. A report by the World Bank noted that the impact of the crisis would hit low-income people hard, especially informal workers in the hospitality, retail trade, and transport sectors who have limited or no access to healthcare or social safety nets. It added that the Covid-19 shock would likely reinforce inequality in South Asia. The sudden and large-scale loss of low-paid work has driven a mass exodus of migrant workers from cities to rural areas, sparking fear that many of them will fall back into poverty, added the World Bank.

“The priority for all South Asian governments is to contain the virus spread and protect their people, especially the poorest, who face considerably worse health and economic outcomes,” said Hartwig Schafer, World Bank Vice President for the South Asia Region. “The Covid-19 crisis is also an urgent call-to-action moment to pursue innovative policies and jumpstart South Asian economies once the crisis is over. Failure to do so can lead to long-term growth disruptions and reverse hard-won progress in reducing poverty.”

The only glimmer of hope comes from Bhutan. The Himalayan Shangri La has not only been the least-affected country in South Asia but may also turn out to be first to get out of the shadow of Covid-19, with no case of infection being reported in the past 14 days.