India needs more testing, not lockdown

Partho Sarothi Ray associate professor, biological sciences, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Kolkata

- RABI BANERJEE

Prof Partho Sarothi Ray, who did his PhD in molecular virology from the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, was one of the scientists consulted by the World Health Organization to judge the character of the coronavirus and formulate a policy to tackle the pandemic. In an exclusive interview with THE WEEK, Ray, associate professor of biological sciences at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Kolkata, says that India lags far behind in detecting the character of the virus, and is therefore clueless about how to deal with Covid-19. Edited excerpts:

The WHO has said that we need to learn to live with this virus. Absolutely right. Are we not living with TB and influenza? This is called attenuation process. As it kills the people it infects, the virus dies, too, thereby losing its ability to infect more people. And so, the virus continues to mutate or change and stays in the population. This is called endemic virus, which has the ability to come back but is not lethal. Only people with low immunity, underlying disease and malnutrition will die. My question is: are they not dying today? Has the government done anything proactive to check malnutrition?

How did you help the WHO?

The WHO has enlisted virologists around the world, I am one of them. They have been constantly in touch with us ever since the outbreak in Wuhan.

They wanted to know the trajectory of the disease, how many varieties this virus could generate, and if it mutates, then to how many forms. This is called knowing the genotypes of the virus.