Pakistan’s lockdown – amongst the best?

The lockdown debate has taken more media airtime than any other corona related discussion. Who did it better? Who was proactive and who was not? Should there be more relaxations, or should it be more stringent? The politics that followed was ugly for most part. All that in a country, which has achieved the maximum possible stringency level of 100, alongside its neighboring India.

This may surprise a few. Don’t forget that none other than the World Health Organization (WHO) had applauded Pakistan’s early response on Covid-19. While the situation may look a bit more relaxed than it was, the government’s responses to the pandemic are much more than just the lockdown– most of which Pakistan still abides by.

The Stringency Index is part of Oxford Covid-19 Government Response Tracker (OxCGRT), and systematically collects information on several different common policy responses. The extent of these scores is measured based on available data, which the researchers ensure in the best way possible to authenticate, and that aggregates that into a common Stringency Index.

While the methodology and the formula are for the academics to analyze, the components that make up the Index appear well-rounded. Closure and containment measures such as school closure, workplace closure, public events cancellations, public transport closure and international travel controls. While Pakistan may well have eased restrictions on a few sectors, the closure of above-mentioned places is still largely in place, and reason why Pakistan has attained the highest possible stringency value.

The Index calculation also includes health and economic measures, as the extent of government response. While Pakistan may have lagged behind trace and test, the steps on the economic front measured on the lines of income support, utility payments waivers, debt relief, salary financing support – are the ones Pakistan has taken well.

And if the values appear too lenient, beware that the effort led by the Blavatnik School of Government, does not appear to have a bias towards Pakistan or India. Any leniency in grading could be equally applicable to values of all countries.

This is not to suggest that Pakistan can now hurry in lifting the restrictions. A Lockdown Rollback Checklist developed under the same research effort, finds Pakistan more towards “more ready to exit lockdown” along with the likes of US, Russia, China and Singapore. No wonder most countries have not completely lifted the restrictions but are gradually thinking of doing the same.