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Indians became covid superspreaders

How a!uent Indians

became covid
superspreaders
Middle- and high-income individuals
and families repeatedly breached
pandemic protocols for frivolous
reasons. The result was infections

Patrons workout at a gym in Mumbai in

October 2020 without wearing face-
masks. (Hindustan Times)

By Shrenik Avlani
LAST UPDATED
26.04.2021 | 07:00 AM IST

In mid-March, The Calcutta Swimming

Club hosted an inter-club darts
tournament in Kolkata. It was a lively
a!air, with dart stations and a bar set
up in an air-conditioned hall. Waiters
in uniform, with their names
embroidered above their shirt pockets
and masks carefully pulled over noses
and mouths, ferried cocktails, beers
and snacks. The contestants, and those
viewing the competition, did not
exercise as much caution. Masks
resting on their chins or tucked away in
their pockets, they tossed darts and
shared laughs.

Just days after the tournament, some

of the participants tested positive for
covid-19. As a precautionary measure,
several clubs had asked their team
members to take a test. The Calcutta
Swimming Club, the host, too asked its
players to undergo RT-PCR tests. It
also requested the participants to stay
away from the club for 10-14 days,
regardless of the result.

Within a week of the tournament, there

came a flurry of covid-positive results.
According to a text message received
by several members of the clubs, 54
participants had tested positive for
covid-19—20 from the Royal Calcutta
Golf Club, nine from the Calcutta
Cricket & Football Club, six each from
The Saturday Club and Calcutta
International Club, four from
Dalhousie Institute, two each from the
Tollygunge Club and Calcutta Punjab
Club, and five from the host club, a
participant who received the text
confirmed to Lounge.

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Last August, when the country was

coming out of the pandemic lockdown
in phases, Jaipur-based Sidhartha
Mehta, 44, and 15 of his friends,
including their spouses, met at a resort
45 minutes outside the city to celebrate
Friendship Day. Ten people from the
group contracted the virus. It then
spiralled into a mini superspreader
event. In Mehta’s household, nine
people tested positive. This included
his wife, children, septuagenarian
parents, household help and driver.
Each of those infected at the meet-up
passed on the infection to at least one
more person in their households.

Also Read: How two masks can double

the protection against covid-19

From Unlock 1.0 onwards, middle-

class Indians across the country have
been getting together and flouting
covid-19 guidelines. The reasons for
doing so have ranged from watching
cricket to holding weddings; from
celebrating birthdays and festivals to
hosting poker nights and weekend
soirees at farmhouses and holiday
homes. Many of these turned into
personal superspreader events.

Just like the darts tournament at The

Calcutta Swimming Club. Just like the
party on the outskirts of Jaipur.

A vast majority of low-income people

in the country often couldn’t a!ord to
stay at home and maintain social
distance. Every day spent at home
meant a day without pay. Their
cramped and poor living conditions
didn’t help even when they stayed put.
But many in India’s middle- and high-
income classes had the means, and the
choice, to abide by the guidelines. And
yet, they didn’t. This is their story.

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The sta! of a hospital with a message to

stay indoors, in March 2020. (Hindustan
Times)

The false notion of a bubble

Why did so many people become so

careless? Ambrish Mithal, chairman of
endocrinology and diabetes at Max
Healthcare, Delhi, says much of this
behaviour stems from a refusal to take
any responsibility.

“People belonging to these sections of

our society believe that they and their
friends are safe as they maintain
hygiene and sanitise everything…there
is sort of an element of bravado that
this can’t happen to us,” says Dr
Mithal.

This was exactly what went through

the mind of 42-year-old marketing
consultant Sooraj when he chose to
watch Indian Premier League games in
early October with four friends in his
man-cave one floor below his flat in
south Kolkata. Like several others
quoted in this story, he did not want
his full name to be used.

“We five have been friends for more

than two decades. We were all staying
at home, following covid-19
guidelines, wearing masks when we
stepped out, washing hands and
sanitising everything and meeting no
one else. But then one of us went for a
birthday party and came to watch the
game. He tested positive for covid-19,
so we went for a test,” he says. Sooraj
tested positive, along with his wife and
mother.

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Also Read: A paya recipe for the

pandemic

“People also have a false notion of a

‘bubble,’” says Dr Mithal, adding,
“there have been plenty of such
instances in Delhi at weddings,
birthday parties, vacations and even
gatherings for funerals where several
members from the group have been
infected.”

Response fatigue

In Jaipur, when Mehta and his friends

met to celebrate Friendship Day, it was
their first in-person catch-up since the
nationwide lockdown was imposed on
24 March last year. “We were very
careful as our parents live with us and
we didn’t meet anyone for more than
four months. After a point, Zoom
sessions and video calls don’t cut it. We
had had enough. All 16 of us who met
for dinner agreed it was about time we
met in person,” says Mehta, a wedding
planner by profession. Neither he nor
his friends still know who was Patient
Zero in their group. They suspect that
they might have caught the virus from
one of the resort sta!. Such an
assumption is a perfect example of Dr
Mithal’s hypothesis that the “It can’t
be us” attitude is a prevalent one
amongst India’s middle class.

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The reason why Mehta and his friends

broke protocol was simply that they
were tired of being at home: a form of
response fatigue. By October, the
World Health Organization (WHO) had
noted that people were exhausted and
fatigued from following appropriate
behaviour.

Also Read: Lessons from the biggest of

all pandemics from a 100 years ago

Response fatigue is real, says Anoop

Amarnath, head of geriatric medicine
at Manipal Hospitals, Bengaluru, and a
member of the Karnataka
government’s critical care support unit
for covid-19. “It was a huge lifestyle
change for people to stay locked in
their homes, wearing masks, keeping
physical distance and not meeting
friends and family. People were
waiting to meet and talk to each other.
Man is a social animal and if you don’t
let him socialise, fatigue is bound to set
in,” he says. He adds that such fatigue
played a significant part in the covid-
19 peaks in September last year.

In Mumbai, Megha, 36, has been

religiously following pandemic
guidelines. A freelance assistant
director living in Andheri, she ventures
out to work for shoots only when she
can’t avoid it, always wears a mask
when out and carries a bottle of
sanitiser. She says she was shocked
when a friend told her in August that
her family was going to perform
Ganesh puja at home. Till then, Megha
says, her friend’s family had been very
careful. “The family invited their
cousins for the puja. There were 10
people in the two-bedroom flat who
sat for the puja and then had a meal
together. Eight of them tested positive
for covid-19 after that puja,” she says,
adding that she has heard of many
such instances across the state.

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If people let their guard down due to

fatigue, one reason could be poor
communication of rules and time
frames. Dr Amarnath says that if there
is a definite time frame for behaviour
modifications to be followed, then
people can be coaxed into doing so.
“But when there is no clarity on how
long the covid-19 protocol is likely to
continue, fatigue is bound to set in.
That’s what we have seen as this
pandemic unfolds,” he says.

Tourists at the Jal Mahal ki Paal in Jaipur,

on New Year's Day, 2021. (Getty Images)

When bravado turns into recklessness

Mehta, chastened by his experience

and wary of being reinfected, didn’t
step out for either a co!ee or a meal
until December, when the covid-19
infections seemed to be on a downward
trajectory. His work as a wedding
planner had resumed in November,
when the wedding season kicked in. In
the first few weddings that he
organised, Mehta says the guests were
nervous and wary and kept their masks
on till food or drinks were served. “By
December, the fear of coronavirus was
on the wane. After a point, mask was
just a protocol, sanitisers placed across
the venue were barely used…covid-19
was not being taken seriously any
more. People were saying, jo hoga
dekha jayega,” he recalls.

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Also Read: Should you be taking a

flight during the pandemic?

In Kolkata, stock market investor

Pavan, who had maintained strict
covid-appropriate behaviour till
November, held a puja in his o"ce to
celebrate Diwali. Members of his
family from two separate households
attended the puja in person, while
o"ce sta! attended virtually via a
video link. After the puja, Pavan and
three others in his household tested
positive.There were five covid-19 cases
in the other household. “It was just our
immediate family, so once we entered
the o"ce the masks were o!,” says
Pavan. Like Mehta, he too suspects
they caught the virus from an
“outsider”. “It couldn’t have been one
of us.”

Such risky behaviour was on the rise

across India from Diwali and probably
peaked around the turn of the year,
doctors say. Over the winter months,
many middle-class Indians travelled
for vacations, hosted parties at
farmhouses and resorts, started going
to restaurants or just got together to
celebrate. “Recklessness around the
New Year contributed to our covid-19
cases,” claims Dr Mithal, who didn’t
travel or meet friends for more than a
year.

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The Pandemic isn’t ‘over’

Dr Amarnath says that through the

first three months of this year, people
felt emboldened by the drop in case
numbers and news of vaccinations.
Many came to the conclusion that the
pandemic was coming to an end and let
their guard down, he says, adding that
this contributed to the second wave we
are currently witnessing.

“I thought covid-19 was almost over.

All nightclubs, pubs and bars were
almost as busy as pre-covid times and
the events at Kolkata’s clubs were
seeing great participation. Also, my
parents had got the vaccine already, so
I felt it was safe. I went for the darts
tournament despite knowing that it
was being held indoors,” says a
participant of the tournament in
Kolkata.

In March, Adarsh, 33, who runs a

family business in Durgapur, West
Bengal, decided to visit his uncle in
Bokaro, Jharkhand, with his younger
brother and sister-in-law for Holi.
During the day-long trip, they stopped
at a highway restaurant for a meal and
celebrated Holi with cousins, returning
home in the evening. Shortly
afterwards, Adarsh started running a
temperature. He tested positive for
covid-19. His octogenarian
grandfather, who had received his first
vaccine shot in February, also
developed a fever and tested positive.
Adarsh’s brother and parents followed
suit. In Bokaro, two of his cousins also
contracted the virus. And the spread
didn’t end there. Adarsh had met a
friend after returning from Bokaro—
the friend also tested positive.

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Also Read: How campus support

groups are helping queer students

It is entirely possible that a variety of

factors played a role in this vicious new
wave of covid-19 rampaging through
the country. But while looking at the
larger causes, we may forget that the
seemingly small actions of individuals
probably played a significant role. One
thing is inescapable: Countless a#uent
middle-class Indians chose to breach
the covid-19 protocols often and for
frivolous reasons. Many of these
breaches ended up having serious
consequences.

Why did they do it? Was it arrogance?

Dr Mithal feels that Indians from this
strata of society simply aren’t used to
being told what to do. Even during a
deadly pandemic.

Shrenik Avlani is a writer and editor and

co-author of The Shivfit Way, a book on
functional fitness.

FIRST PUBLISHED

26.04.2021 | 07:00 AM IST

TOPICS

covid-19

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