68% believe weekend lockdowns have negligible impact: Study

NEW DELHI: Contrary to state governments imposing 'weekend lockdowns', implementing stricter restrictions on movement during weekends is not seen as an effective method to contain the spread of coronavirus and people feel that governments should instead opt for locking down regions with a high incidence of coronavirus cases.
A study conducted by LocalCircles, a community social media-based pollster, said that 68% of citizens believe weekend lockdowns have negligible or minor impact in containing the spread of Covid-19. In the earlier LocalCircles polls, 66%-74% citizens in the last 3 weeks have been consistently saying that there should be a complete lockdown in the 15 high viral load districts in India.
The survey, based on over 16,000 votes from 201 districts of India, asked if people believe weekend lockdowns are useful in containing the pandemic to which only 28% said the impact is good while 24% said the impact is minor. Around 44% of respondents said such measures are meaningless and 4% did not have an opinion.
The study comes at a time when several state governments have resorted to imposing lockdowns over the weekend to curb non-essential travel. The Uttar Pradesh government recently announced a 2-day ‘weekend lockdown’ saying that it wants to restrict non-essential movement that increases over weekends. Odisha had also announced a weekend shutdown in 10 districts with high caseload recently. Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh ordered a stricter lockdown on weekends and public holidays, with movement to be restricted to e-pass holders. Similarly, in Madhya Pradesh, cities like Bhopal and Indore have been observing weekend lockdown and is now implementing a Sunday lockdown across the state.
As per the ministry of health and family Welfare (MOHFW) report last week, 49 districts now contribute to 80% of India's Covid-19 spread.
Around 69% citizens feel a stringent lockdown in these 49 districts is much needed and is an efficient way to contain the spread of Covid-19.
This premise by people is finding traction from Chennai's experience where authorities implemented a complete lockdown from June 19 to July 5 following which the city witnessed the number of cases going down by almost 50% from the 2,400-2,500 per day range in the third week of June to 1,200 in the 2nd week of July, said LocalCircles.
As per the pollster, citizens also gave a thumbs up to 10-day lockdowns announced across several cities and districts of Maharashtra.
According to LocalCircles, given how India has witnessed a 600% rise in cases between the second week of May to the second week of July, people continue to believe that unless the virus is contained in high load districts, India will soon surpass the USA in terms of daily cases becoming the most impacted country in the world.
Over two-thirds of 16,000 respondents believe that these weekend lockdowns have no or little effectiveness and instead, a targeted 3-4 week lockdown in all districts that make up 80% of India’s caseload is the best way forward.