MUMBAI: India has ramped up the screening of travellers to keep the coronavirus at bay but a flurry of new cases has experts warning that it may be hard to contain a spread in densely populated South Asia with its generally poor medical infrastructure.
India, Pakistan and Bangladesh are home to some 1.7 billion people, or more than a fifth of the world’s population, but their over-stretched health systems could struggle to handle the type of intensive care required for coronavirus patients.
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On top of that, a prevalence of existing health problems such as diabetes could spell trouble while the sort of sweeping restrictions China has imposed to stifle the virus would be hugely difficult in South Asia’s more unruly cities.
“The way Indian society is structured, the kind of lockdown that many countries including China and Japan have instituted, is pretty much impossible even under good circumstances,” said Vivekanand Jha, executive director of the George Institute for Public Health, in New Delhi.
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As India reports coronavirus cases, experts fear South Asia spread
Byindianadmin
Mar 5, 2020