Are local lockdowns slowing the spread of coronavirus? Here's what the data says

Various cities and districts recently imposed new restrictions. ET looks at data from five metros: Two cities that didn’t impose fresh hard local lockdowns after the national unlock began, and three cities that did.

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Data from the five cities shows that cases can fall even without local lockdowns, and localised curbs can have either limited or somewhat bigger impact. Take a look:

Delhi:

• Cases rose faster in restrictive Unlock 1.
• Case growth slowed during more liberal Unlock 2.
• Capital had no local lockdown.
• Therefore, hard to link lockdown to slowing infection.

Mumbai:

• Mumbai had high infection rate during national lockdown.
• City relaxed very few curbs after national lockdown was eased.
• Case growth fell over two Unlock periods.
• Therefore, no robust impact of lockdown seen on infection rate.

Chennai:

• Infection spread as unlock happened.
• Average cases appear to have come down some time after the local lockdown ended.
• But current level of average cases still higher than in early June.
• City lockdown may have had a positive impact.

Pune:

• Pune saw sharp rise during Unlock 1 and 2.
• Local lockdown coincided with the beginning of a decline in cases.
• Average number of cases still high.
• Since local lockdown was till end-July, proper assessment would require some more time.

Bengaluru Urban:

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• City saw massive spike as national unlock continued.
• After local lockdown, case growth was arrested.
• But level of average daily numbers remains high.
• Local lockdown hasn’t reversed the trend as yet.

Implications:

• More sero surveys needed to gauge true nature of spread.
• More studies needed to see if most transmissions happening in small areas (like households or a cluster of homes) rather than over large areas.
• Lockdowns meaningless if not used to ramp up health facilities, contact-tracing and testing.
• Experience from H1N1 shows that lockdowns are unsustainable beyond a certain period, have socio-economic and medical consequences.

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