Standing Committee submits report on the management of COVID-19

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The Standing Committee on Home Affairs submitted its report on the management of the COVID-19 pandemic

Key recommendations of the Committee include:

Preparedness:

The Committee noted that the sudden imposition of the lockdown caused an unprecedented economic disruption.
It also caused fear and anxiety among migrant workers leading to large scale movement of migrants back to their home states.
To address such a crisis in the future, the Committee recommended framing a national plan and guidelines under the Disaster Management Act, 2005 and the Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897.

Health infrastructure:

The Committee noted that the central and state governments incurred heavy expenditure on COVID-19 treatment.
It noted the need for a strong public healthcare system to deal with such shocks.
Therefore, it recommended greater investment in health infrastructure to scale up public health services and increasing budgetary allocation to public hospitals.

Vaccines:

The Committee recommended that while undertaking vaccine trials, all mandatory requirements must be fulfilled, and all phases of the trial must be completed.
The Committee noted that emergency use authorisation should only be used in the rarest of rare cases.

Data collection:

The Committee noted that a study is needed to understand the patterns in test rate, recovery and fatality rate.
It also recommended that relevant data should be made publicly available to the research community to provide inputs for COVID-19 management, and to provide real-time solutions to control the pandemic.
Such disclosure should follow principles of data anonymisation, security and privacy laws.

Malpractices:

The Committee noted reports of private hospitals selling beds for treatment and black-marketing and overpricing of certain medicines.
It recommended a comprehensive national public health Act to keep a check on private hospitals and black-marketing, and creating awareness campaigns on availability of cheaper and effective repurposed medicines.

Social impact :

To address the social impact of COVID-19 on the poor, the Committee recommended that a national database on migrant workers be launched at the earliest to help in their identification and to ensure delivery of rations and benefits to them.

Food distribution:

The Committee recommended that until all states implement One Nation One Ration card, inter-state operability of ration cards must be allowed.

Economic impact :

The Committee observed that MSMEs were very adversely affected during the pandemic.
It noted the need to support MSMEs with dire working capital requirements to sustain the impact of COVID-19.