Dr. T Jacob John, India’s foremost virologist, epidemiologist and researcher in a daily conversation with Jagdish Rattanani, journalist and editor of Foundation of The Billion Press, to build what we call the COVID-19 diary
JR: What is the situation looking like, what are your reflections and thoughts for today?
There are two parallel, diametrically opposed scenarios in India. One is people like us, who, and many others who are worried about this and are taking the problem seriously, taking personal care for not getting infected and that’s on the one side. And lot of doctors and lot of media. In parallel, I see a majority of people are taking it very lightly. I see a lot of people walking around with no mask today. So I see them from inside my house and so I walked up to the road and there were two youngsters. So I told them, ‘I believe that mask is compulsory and police have the power to fine Rs.500 if they see people without mask’. Immediately they put their hands to the pocket and they took out two handkerchiefs and they said thank you, they put their handkerchief on their nose and then they walked away.
So a lot of people are not wearing masks, that means the seriousness has not been explicitly told to a lot of people. Today, I saw a funeral procession in front of our road because the crematorium, the local crematorium, is about a 10-minute walk from our gate. I counted 42 people in the funeral procession...only eight were wearing masks. I counted them. So that doesn’t make sense.
So a lot of people are not wearing masks, that means the seriousness has not been explicitly told to a lot of people. Today, I saw a funeral procession in front of our road because the crematorium, the local crematorium, is about a 10-minute walk from our gate. I was home, well, of course, I am always home. We heard the noise and we just watched the funeral procession, the body in a motorised vehicle and seven people inside the vehicle near the body, and not a single one wearing a mask. The driver was also not wearing a mask. I counted 42 people in the procession; in the funeral procession, you know it is not marching, it is just disorganised. Three fellows on drums…drum beating is a common thing here. Three young boys leading the procession, not wearing mask. And so the man, or son, or somebody who carries the earthen-pot, and bare bodied, so that person is not wearing a mask. That is understandable, that is a religious ritual. But how is it that out of this 42 people, only eight were wearing masks. I counted them. So that doesn’t make sense. A colleague of mine who has retired and lives quite far away from Vellore city, she said, ‘I just took a ride around, because I was bored’. She must be about 60…65, less than 65 I think. And she said that she doesn’t see anyone wearing a mask on the road, or hardly anybody wearing a mask. She went to the most popular shopping centre…shopping centre meaning, what do you call it department store…and she said she didn’t have the heart to go in, she said the place was crowded and hardly anybody wearing a mask. So, in another words, what I am seeing is, this gross complacency or lack of information or taking things lightly and not understanding the seriousness that is the majority of people. And then I got three people sharing a video to me, the man’s name is Bharat Mehra.
JR: Okay
This gentleman. And he gave a long talk, the gist of which is, May 1 is the end of the epidemic in India and after May 1 India will be number one in the world because we have achieved corona control before everybody else and we will be getting…there will be long queues for Indian visa in all the embassies, Indian embassies in many countries. They all will want to come to India and they all want to pull business from China to India. So, India will be number one by, he is saying, by end of 2020. And this is going around. And three people send this, shared this to me. You know there is a psychology when you are personally threatened; good news is more believable and acceptable than bad news. When you are reading a newspaper, bad news is more appreciated, sensationalised because I think the psychology is that what happened is to somebody else, not me. Somebody else’s suffering is entertainment. But here you are…you know threatened, and then good news is what comforts you. So, a combination of denial which is a natural reaction when faced with the possibility of say, a cancer, and those kind of denial is a normal phenomenon, but leaders don’t go into that mode of denials. Because the price that you pay for denial is so huge, and yes the individual can deny, but then national leader would never deny; they should not deny. Trump may be an exception. Okay, so rest of the leaders have, even though at first they might have said… they don’t think it is a serious thing, like the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson. But they turned around when the technical people advised them otherwise.
Because the price that you pay for denial is so huge, and yes the individual can deny, but then national leader would never deny; they should not deny. Trump may be an exception. Okay, so rest of the leaders have, even though at first they might have said… they don’t think it is a serious thing, like the UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson. But they turned around when the technical people advised them otherwise.
So a lot of people are not wearing masks, that means the seriousness has not been explicitly told to a lot of people. Today, I saw a funeral procession in front of our road because the crematorium, the local crematorium, is about a 10-minute walk from our gate. I was home, well, of course, I am always home. We heard the noise and we just watched the funeral procession, the body in a motorised vehicle and seven people inside the vehicle near the body, and not a single one wearing a mask. The driver was also not wearing a mask. I counted 42 people in the procession; in the funeral procession, you know it is not marching, it is just disorganised. Three fellows on drums…drum beating is a common thing here. Three young boys leading the procession, not wearing mask. And so the man, or son, or somebody who carries the earthen-pot, and bare bodied, so that person is not wearing a mask. That is understandable, that is a religious ritual. But how is it that out of this 42 people, only eight were wearing masks. I counted them. So that doesn’t make sense.
JR: She did not go into the department store?
No, she went into the parking lot, peeped in, found the place crowded, she never saw anybody practicing physical distance, she used the word social distance…so… underneath the lockdown facade, life seem to be normal for a lot of people
JR: Correct, could it be because this is Vellore, it’s a smaller town, the messages are not reaching well, or the police is not able to enforce and that larger towns are better, or not?
Aarey, only yesterday, Vellore was called a hotspot.
JR: Oh okay.
I didn’t know that, my daughter-in-law sent me a message saying that Vellore district has been classified as a hotspot by Tamil Nadu government. So, there are several cases, one or two deaths in different parts of the city. One spot is related to the Tableegi Jammat incident in Delhi’s Nizamuddin. These people belong to one particular Muslim predominant area called Kasba and I was told that Kasba is totally cordoned off. So the lockdown is strictly implemented there. And that geographic area is out of bound for outsiders, none of them can come out. So that means the police has taken it seriously. So that is one part not far away from the centre of the city. The others are scattered in four or five places within the city and if one is diagnosed, then that family is tested and there are two to three members of the family. Like that, there are few spots in Vellore and also near neighbouring towns, within the district. So the district is now called a hotspot for COVID.
(A doctor friend) went into the parking lot of department store, peeped in, found the place crowded; she never saw anybody practicing physical distance, she used the word social distance…so… underneath the lockdown facade, life seem to be normal for a lot of people
Yet, yet I don’t see any sense of urgency in people’s mind. So that’s an extremely worrisome thing, and then I saw this video of this Mehra guy saying, everything is fine, the end of epidemic is May 1,, after India going to number one, then people would then accept the Indian-style of vegetarian food, and what else did he say, and ya, and all the business will come to India etcetera etcetera, the India Shining message.
Anybody who sees that will think that life is normal, except for the lockdown. And the lockdown in India, the best behaviour is obeying orders. From childhood onwards, we are taught, do as you are told. Parents do that to children, teachers do that to school pupils, and you don’t question anything, you just accept and obey orders. So we are locking down. And every obedience to a rule is, you look around if no body looking you, disobey. Somebody’s looking at you, strictly follow the orders;, that is a childish behaviour.
JR: So do you think this is a communications problem or behavioural problem among Indians?
Ya, information has to be internalised, that’s a very important step in. It’s not just information out there, but internalise it saying information is for you. And then it has got to be convincing that a person has got to get convinced that it’s for real. And that depends upon who gives what message.
And the ya, surprisingly video by my son from United States send me that every country led by a woman; Finland, Germany, Iceland, Taiwan, Hong Kong, New Zealand, they said all of them are doing well, all of them them….these people addressed the nation a very early on, and the nation is actually with the leader.
And two of them, one is Jacinda Ardern in New Zealand and I don’t know which one, I think the Finish, youngest Prime Minister (Sanna Marin) addressed children separately. Of course, the German chancellor took thing seriously and told the people; I believe same thing happened in Iceland; same in Taiwan, in Hong Kong. In spite of the Hong Kong unrest, at the head, there is a woman leader (Carrie Lam). So, that is very interesting to think about, the feminine psyche taking things seriously, the motto is hit hard and hit early versus the macho, who thinks that, ‘I am macho I can handle anything, come on, let’s just come on.’
JR: Bring it on…
I mean there are people who take lockdown very seriously, particularly old people; they are taking it very seriously, somehow the messages have gotten to them and their families. But the ones whom I see on the roads are men and women of middle age and below, they no…they don’t behave as if there is a pandemic or epidemic going on. Okay.
Yeah bring it on, bring it on, I will handle this. So that kind of machismo is being seen in many countries. I don’t want to name any….I can name two, like the US and the UK, and India is included, macho feeling gives a wrong impression to the people saying that, okay, the Prime Minister Boris Johnson was not wearing mask, Trump refuses to wear mask, and Modi except for the one occasion I have never seen him wearing the mask. So leaders have to carry the people along…. that macho comes in to say, ‘I am a strong guy’ and in doing so, is misreading the message, which countries like South Korea, Singapore, even Australia did not misread, Japan did not misread. But I think, South Asian countries have misread. And actually, our culture is 5000 years old, still surviving culture, the secret of our survival is always ignoring every threat, and accepting the consequences and wait for the threat to die out. The only two times it did not work, is when Mughals came, they came and they became the rulers; then the British came, and then they also became the rulers. We accepted everything as our fate or whatever and yet the culture continued; we didn’t change our culture. So I think culturally we are willing to pay the price for staying the course of our culture and this Mehra talk is that we stay our course of our culture, everything will pass, just wait. Because that’s one way of looking at it. Very stoically accepting whatever happens.
JR: But the price will be paid then?
Price will be big. Okay
Ya, I mean you wouldn’t think there is a lockdown, the street in front of our house, during the morning hours. Okay, so…I mean there are people who take lockdown very seriously, particularly old people; they are taking it very seriously, somehow the messages have gotten to them and their families. But the ones whom I see on the roads are men and women of middle age and below, they no…they don’t behave as if there is a pandemic or epidemic going on. Okay.
The, there should be sensible hand washing. It is not repeated hand washing without reason. That is the message that everybody is getting. You know that is illogical, that every two hours or three hours, go wash your hands. It is touch-based washing, touching some surface then wash, receiving a mail, then wash. So that message has to go through. It is touch-based.
This conversation was recorded on April 17