Covid-19 menace has ruined the financial status of large number of Indians, particularly from middle-class and daily wage earners. While on one account they suffered due to loss of livelihood options in the wake of government restrictions during this period and they were also pushed into indebtedness due to unregulated charges by hospitals and medical professionals.
Moreover, most of people were locked up in huge expenditure only against tests. According to a study conducted by a Nagapur-based consumer rights civil social group Grahak Bharati, during last two years, Indians have spent a stupendous amount of Rs 74,000 crore on Covid 19 tests, probably more than what the Government of India spent on vaccination. It accused that it was nothing but a `massive loot’ of the Indian public. It urged for a intense probe into this loot.
The study found that during last two years as many as 74 crore Covid 19 tests were conducted in the country, of which most of the tests were conducted by dubious private pathological labs, the absence regulative mechanism monitoring such tests. This makes us to believe on an average, on each test people were forced to spent about Rs 1,000
Incidentally, only around 6 per cent of tests, around 4.20 crore positive cases were deteched from these tests, with more than 5 lakh deaths, till date. It may be recalled that India is one among three countries that recorded more than 5 lakh Covid-related deaths in the world.
Of these 3,255, only 2,141 (764 government and 1,377 private) labs are for conducting the much-in-demand, compulsory for most purposes and universally accepted RTPCR tests., and the remaining 1,114 (647 government+467) labs offer the other tests.
During early days, a test was costing around Rs 3,500 or more, but gradually, the figures have stabilised to around Rs 600, besides cheap home-test kits available for around Rs 250 now.
Grahak Bharati founder-president Barrister Vinod Tiwari deplored that a majority of these tests were virtually forced on the people, even though they had no initial symptoms or unnecessary considering the low positivity rate and ended up spooking the country in the name of coronavirus.
In series of letters sent to the Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Health and family Welfare Minister Mansukh Mandaviya, Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray, the ICMR, senior central and state government officials, Grahak Bharati has demanded a probe into the “massive unbridled dacoity” being perpetrated on the gullible Indians.
He warned that if the government fails to take priority cognisance of this nationwide racket, Grahak Bharati would file a PIL in the Supreme Court. Alleging that it is “a systematic mega-scam” with the connivance of government officials, unscrupulous private labs and their franchisees operating with the generous blessings of politicians, Tiwari contended that it violates provisions of the central Clinical Establishments (Registration and Regulation) Act, 2010 and make such shady labs liable for severe penal action.
The worrisome aspect is that merely based on these illegally-conducted tests, the government has been taking major policy decisions like lockdowns, restrictions, curbs on inter-district, inter-state and even international public movements, which in turn has spelled the death-knell for the economy. India ranks second globally (after the USA) in terms of the total infectees notched up till date.
