The district administrations including Srinagar have started implementing the idea of containment zones to deal with the coronavirus disease (COVID-19). It is a simple mechanism. The clusters which have seen a rise in COVID-19 cases or have shown traces of rapid transmission are sealed.
As per officials, all entry-exit points in areas declared as containment zones, have been sealed, at least half of these points with removable barriers to enable access into and out of them as and when required.
In simple terms, the idea of containment zones entails strict enforcement of lockdown with a complete ban on the movement of residents. The movement into these zones is limited to a small set of officials and health care workers. From the provision of essential services to handling emergencies to the execution of surveillance activities, all kinds of requisites are taken care of by the administration as part of the mechanism put in place in these areas. As per the experiment made in India and globally, aggressive screening and enhanced testing is done in these clusters. The system revolves around the idea that this would allow authorities to identify each person who is infected, offer isolation and treatment, and reduce their interface and the interface of all those they may have come in contact with. This would, thus contain the pestilence to a specific geography and eventually diminish its spread.
The containment zones may cause inconvenience to the residents, by restricting their mobility almost entirely and making them dependent on administration and select private vendors for supplies. However, this inconvenience, and the brief curtailment of rights, is worth it for the larger objective of containing the dreadful disease. The fact that this strategy has now been expanded will also help the administration judge its efficacy.
One hope that the administration ensures supplies to the citizens as well as conducts screening and aggressive testing to find out the transmission of the disease in these areas and essentially live up to the basic idea. It will enable the treatment of those who have got infected, deaths will be avoided or kept to a minimal, and the chain of transmission is broken. It is incumbent on the administration to be mindful of the fact that the possible benefits in declaring containment zones far outweigh the costs. Also, the administration must remember that the success of the idea hinges on the eventual lifting of the lockdown.
