Ahh, I so much love China!

Ahh, I so much love China and Russia

Well, liberal democracy has to walk along with all the stakeholders, unlike a totalitarian state. However, when it comes to imposing critical and essential restrictions, as was done by New York that Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, to contain and control Coronavirus spread in New York, it was struck down by the conservative supreme court bench in favor of the Orthodox Jewish Organization and the Roman Catholic, the former having a high incidence of COVID.

As I read from the New York Times (link cited below), “The restrictions are strict. In shifting “red zones,” where the coronavirus risk is highest, no more than 10 people may attend religious services. In slightly less dangerous “orange zones,” which are also fluid, attendance is capped at 25. This applies even to churches that can seat more than 1,000 people”. “The Constitution does not forbid states from responding to public health crises through regulations that treat religious institutions equally or more favorably than comparable secular institutions, particularly when those regulations save lives,” Justice Sotomayor wrote. “Because New York’s Covid-19 restrictions do just that, I respectfully dissent.”

I am not sure how these numbers arise? 10, 25, 50, 100 etc. I have seen such flaunt numbers from different administrations, only to create fault lines and not fix the solution. At least my simple logic dictates that these numbers are irrelevant, and should directly be correlated with the index case or the sentinel case.

Is a numeric threshold right?

I was talking with my uncle back in India and I realized, the small village where our farms are, have no COVID in their vicinity. Obviously, I was concerned for the second crop and other agricultural activities. The best practice is to quarantine the cities and not the countryside, which as free of disease. Let the commerce flow and let the business flourish if the impact is minimal.

When I talk with my network in China, I see that the lockdown has strictly adhered to. Well, who is right? Liberal democracy with one foot backward and one foot forward, or a totalitarian state with both feet aligned?

There can never be a cookie-cutter approach or a standardized way to resolve this conundrum. Our only recourse is to evaluate each situation separately? A lot of human intelligence (Can AI help?). Irrespective, it is an individual choice versus the state responsibility towards all. Science cannot be ignored despite knowing its incompleteness. However, we can only see on the basis of current visibility.

It is obvious, that a bench is favoring a decision despite its lack of requisite (medical) background, competence and expertise to assess public health and its accountable for the people. At least for now, the public concern is thrown out of the window.

It is hard to customize and still retain the luster of the fundamental amendments (the first, second, etc.). However, it is a rope walk and if you ask a lazy person like me, I love China!

Shashank Heda