NEW DELHI, July 17: The government authorities are at unease over heightened mobility in most parts of the country just as the Covid pandemic situation is showing downward trend but far from “being over.” Not only hill stations and tourists places, almost all districts of the country are recording high mobility, in many cases even more than the pre-Covid normal situation, the government said citing Google data.
With restrictions being eased across the country, mobility has seen a sharp rise, which may impact the spread of the Covid-19 infection in the country, the health ministry has cautioned. Based on Google community mobility data, the ministry recently presented a comparison of community mobility between May 20 and July 10, which showed that the overall movement of people has become manifold in these two months.
“Most of the districts have reached pre-Covid level mobility. Some have registered more mobility than previous times,” Lav Agarwal, joint secretary of the ministry of health said reiterating the need of adhering to Covid-appropriate behaviour.
According to the map showing data as of July 10, a few places in Kerala and the northeast have negative mobility. Some districts of western, central and northeastern India too have lower mobility. But the rest of India has normal or more than normal mobility with the transformation having taken place between May and July.
The comparison also reveals that while the sudden crowding at tourist places has become a cause of concern, high mobility is recorded in the majority of districts, which may not be tourist spots.
The overall Covid-19 situation in the country in July has marked significant improvement. But crowding, violation of Covid-19 norms have thrown fresh challenges in front of India’s Covid-19 management. The crowding of people in hill stations without masks has been referred to as “alarming” by the ministry. Prime Minister Narendra Modi too raised the issue and alerted his ministers, officials against the third wave of the pandemic, the threat of which is real for India.
Only a handful of districts in India are still under lockdown or lockdown-like restrictions as Kerala, Maharashtra and the northeast have been identified as pockets where the Covid-19 situation has either plateaued or is becoming worse.
(Manas Dasgupta)