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Lockdown not a solution to fight Covid-19, need to ramp up testing: Rahul Gandhi
Rahul Gandhi on Thursday held a press conference via video-conferencing where he highlighted the importance of testing in fight against Covid-19.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday held a press meet via video-conferencing where he said that government’s testing level for coronavirus is not up to the mark, and is neither strategic. He also said that lockdown is just a pause button, and not a solution to check the spread of Covid-19.
“We are in a very serious situation. People of India and parties need to work together,” Gandhi said in his opening remarks.
“I have been speaking to large number of experts, both in India and abroad, as well as outside the government who have a better understanding of what is going on. We need to understand that lockdown is a pause button, it’s not a solution to coronavirus,” he further said.
“When we come out of the lockdown, the virus will again begins its work. So we need to have a strategy,” said Gandhi.
Speaking on Covid-19 testing in India, he said, there is a need to ramp up your testing facility, to prepare our hospitals. The biggest weapon in fight against Covid-19 is testing - it will tell us where the virus is moving, so you can understand where it is going, so you can isolate it.”
“Our testing is not enough to understand where the virus is moving, and it has to go from chasing the virus to getting ahead of it,” added the Congress leader.
Gandhi has been critical of the Centre’s handling of coronavirus outbreak.
On Wednesday, he demanded that emergency ration cards should be issued to those facing a shortage of foodgrains during the lockdown enforced to contain coronavirus.
In a tweet, he had said lakhs of people were unable to take benefit of the public distribution system (PDS) as they do not have ration cards.
Earlier this month, he had taken a dig at the BJP-led government over the way lockdown was enforced, saying no country with such a huge number of migrant labourers has attempted it without arranging for their stay and food.
With 941 more Covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours, India’s coronavirus tally crossed the 12,000 mark with the tally reading at 12,380 cases, said the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Thursday.
