Kerala village orders people to carry umbrellas when outside to ensure physical distancing

In a novel way to enforce social distancing, Alappuzha's Thanneermukkom village in Kerala on Sunday has mandated that all residents must hold an umbrella when they step outside, as stated by Kerala Finance minister Dr. Thomas Isaac. The idea behind this move is that if two umbrellas do not touch each other in public, it will ensure a minimum distance of one meter from one another. Umbrellas are distributed at a subsidized rate in the village, stated Isaac.

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Kerala's efforts to tackle Coronavirus

With over 1.75 lakh individuals under observation, Kerala has undertaken a huge testing drive to identify and isolate the highest number of cases in the state. As of Thursday, the state had sent 5,342 samples for testing - which is the highest among all states. Of these 3,768 have returned negative, declaring 176 positive. Ahead of PM Modi's Rs 15,000 crore relief package, the state government had Govt introduced Rs 20,000 Cr relief & support package along with free rations for all.

The state government also announced thousands of community kitchens throughout the state and home-delivery of meals. Kerala has also passed an ordinance which gives the state government extraordinary powers to deal with the current COVID-19 outbreak by imposing restrictions on essential services and impose a  2-year penalty on curfew violators. Currently, Kerala- which witnessed the first COVID-19 patient in India, has 458 active cases with 338 patients recovered and 4 deaths.

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Kerala's privacy issues

The state's swift COVID-19 curbing with effective surveillance and testing which has earned praise globally has embroiled it into controversy. Reports state that the CPI(M)-led government used Sprinklr, a SaaS (Software as a Service) company to aide grassroots health workers to compile data on people about their symptoms and health conditions - which has been criticised by the Opposition, raising the transfer of crucial health data of the citizens to pharmaceutical companies. The Kerala High Court has directed the state government to anonymize all data collected and collated so far and allow US-firm Sprinklr to access data only after anonymization is completed.

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