An Assessment of Covid 19 Strategies for Selected States of India – Lessons Learned for Future Pandemics

Introduction COVID 19 pandemic has severely affected the world and the impact is not uniformly distributed over space and among varying socio economic, demographic and epidemiological characteristics of population. Government has undertaken several strategies to prevent the adverse impact of COVID 19. Hence, this paper attempts to critically analyse the government's strategies in regions of India having varied vulnerabilities. Objectives The objectives of this paper is to identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of COVID 19 response model of selected states of India to highlight the lessons learned for dealing with future pandemics. Also, emphasis has been given to analyse the role of vulnerabilities as part of government's strategies. Methodology A SWOT analysis has been performed in this paper through understanding of vulnerabilities and COVID response model of three states of India. The selected states are Madhya Pradesh, Telangana and Nagaland having highest overall COVID 19 vulnerability index among the EAG, Non EAG and North Eastern states respectively as formulated by Acharya and Porwal, 2020. The information and data has been collected through government websites of each state and several reports like Rural Health Statistics, National Health Profile etc has been referred. Critical Findings The findings of this paper reveal that the EAG states of India have higher socio economic vulnerabilities on the other hand, Non EAG states have higher demographic and epidemiological vulnerabilities. The government response model of each of the state largely followed the government guidelines rather than assessment of their own community needs. Very little efforts have been made to address the state specific vulnerabilities. Conclusion It can be concluded from this paper that there is a need for region specific strategies for combating the pandemic as each region have their own different needs and vulnerabilities. Further, identified strengths and opportunities should be encouraged and attention should be given on weaknesses and threats. Saif Nihal | Anjali Sharma "An Assessment of Covid-19 Strategies for Selected States of India – Lessons Learned for Future Pandemics" Published in International Journal of Trend in Scientific Research and Development (ijtsrd), ISSN: 2456-6470, Volume-5 | Issue-3 , April 2021, URL: https://www.ijtsrd.com/papers/ijtsrd39962.pdf Paper URL: https://www.ijtsrd.com/humanities-and-the-arts/social-science/39962/an-assessment-of-covid19-strategies-for-selected-states-of-india-–-lessons-learned-for-future-pandemics/saif-nihal