Editorial: The lockdown lifestyle

Referred to as Non-Communicable Diseases or NCDs, lifestyle diseases are a product of environmental, genetic, physiological, and behavioural factors.

Experts in healthcare have cited there are four conditions that form the bulk of NCDs in India, namely cardiovascular diseases, chronic respiratory disease, cancer, and diabetes. There is a massive human and economic toll exacted by these conditions on a yearly basis. Almost 63 per cent of deaths in the country are attributed annually to these conditions. The number of people ailing from just one such health issue far outnumber the COVID count in India. The nation has for long, held the dubious distinction of being the diabetes capital of the world, with over 70 mn affected.

The status quo will not change soon as owing to the lockdowns, a new generation of Indians are being diagnosed with one or the other co-morbidity of COVID-19 – hypertension, obesity and diabetes, putting them at greater risk from the virus. COVID-19 has only exacerbated an already existing situation. But several developments in India over many decades allowed for such an unhealthy milieu to prevail.

For instance, rapid and unplanned urbanisation, and globalisation have been credited as two of the major contributors to the lifestyle diseases epidemic of India. A UN study called the World Urbanization Prospects 2018 pegged the nation’s urban population at 460.78 mn in 2018, which is close to 34 per cent of its total population. Essentially, 1 in every 3 Indians lives in cities – urban sprawls that are already buckling under the strain of unmanaged populations, qualitatively deficient public healthcare facilities, and an absence of open spaces for recreation. Add to this mixture, unrealistically long commute times, haphazard and stressful working hours, and a sedentary lifestyle punctuated by doses of junk food, binge-watching shows, and tobacco usage, and it’s a potent recipe for a health disaster of epic proportions.

Apart from these, what the pandemic managed to do is cut short many of the rhythms intrinsic to our lives – things taken for granted in the pre-COVID era – the morning shopping for veggies, a stopover at a friend’s place for dinner, and outdoor activities of any kind, including exercising. Even a brisk half an hour walk around the neighbourhood is not feasible during the pandemic as many Chennaiites found out the hard way, after being fined by the Corporation officials for endangering public safety. And not everyone confined to their homes embraced yoga, as the Centre had propagated it during the month of June.

Thankfully, Tamil Nadu has decided to let gyms in the state to begin functioning, keeping in mind social distancing from Aug 10, offering much respite to a populace who had been denied their daily workouts for too long. Even then, post-COVID-19, the healthcare infrastructure, will have to brace itself for yet another onslaught. This time around, it will be faced with thousands of new patients who might have managed to survive the pandemic, but who might have developed NCDs that will require a lifetime of treatment, monitoring, and upkeep. This will increase the economic and care-giving burden on India’s existing healthcare framework tremendously. It is imperative that the Centre in its forthcoming budgets significantly increases its allocations towards the healthcare segment, more specifically towards lifestyle ailments. And states will need to follow suit and aid in the creation of suitable public healthcare infrastructure. In the absence of this, a majority of our population would always have to look over its shoulder.