democracynow--2020-05-21--From Syria to U.S.-Mexico Border, Refugees Worldwide Face Hunger & Deprivation as COVID-19 Spreads

This is a rush transcript .
Copy may not be in its final form .
AMY GOODMAN : This is Democracy Now !
, democracynow.org , The Quarantine Report .
I ’ m Amy Goodman , with Nermeen Shaikh , as we look now to the spread of the coronavirus across the globe and how it ’ s threatening the health and safety of tens of millions of refugees , from Bangladesh to Syria to Greece to the U.S.-Mexico border .
After weeks of warnings , COVID-19 cases are emerging in refugee camps , where social distancing is often impossible @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Lebanon , a woman at a Palestinian refugee camp tested positive for the virus .
In Greece , hundreds of asylum seekers , many from Africa , have contracted COVID-19 .
For the estimated 5.6 million Syrian refugees in Lebanon , Jordan and Turkey , the threat of coronavirus also has led to a crisis of hunger , with the U.N. estimating 70 % of refugees can not afford food .
This is a Syrian refugee , Abu Abdallah , speaking along with his wife , Umm Abdallah , from a camp @ @ @ @ @ @ @ AMY GOODMAN : Well , for more , we ’ re going to Oxford , England , where we ’ re joined by Dr. Miriam Orcutt , senior research fellow in global public health and forced migration at the Institute for Global Health , University College London , and executive director of Lancet Migration .
We welcome you to Democracy Now !
Can you start off by just giving us the scope and scale of the refugee crisis in the world ?
A tall order .
DR. MIRIAM ORCUTT : Thank you .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ currently the levels of forcibly displaced populations — that includes refugees , internally displaced and others — is at the highest levels ever recorded by the U.N .
So , 70.8 million people around the world have been forcibly displaced .
And actually , the highest number of those are internally displaced people , those who might have been forced to flee their homes from conflict , from violence or from persecution , who may be displaced multiple times within their own country even before they flee across international borders .
NERMEEN SHAIKH @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we mentioned in the introduction to the segment , 70 % of Syrians — of course , Syrians constitute the largest number of refugees in the world — 70 % of Syrian refugees in Lebanon report that they can ’ t afford food .
If you could talk about that and also the fact that a large number of Syrian refugees are not only in Lebanon , but also in Turkey , which has seen a large outbreak , a significant outbreak , of COVID-19 , even though now cases are reportedly declining @ @ @ @ @ @ @ For the Syrian displaced population in all the countries surrounding Syria , the context of COVID-19 has been a huge challenge and burden .
Not only do many of them still live in informal settlements — so , a lot of them , even after seven or eight years , are living in tents .
They don ’ t have access often to livelihood opportunities , so they can ’ t provide income for their families .
And so they ’ re often dependent already , even pre-COVID , on humanitarian aid and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ provision , from outside .
They ’ re not able to be self-sufficient .
So you can imagine , in both Lebanon and in Turkey , that people who are living in tents beside each other in very crowded and cramped conditions , who often share one toilet or one running water tap between many families , will have a real challenge to prevent the spread of COVID , but also just to maintain their basic standard of living during this public health crisis .
And one of the things that we ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ world but definitely within the countries surrounding Syria , is individuals who were already facing poverty now not being able to afford food , as you mentioned in your previous report , and not being able to provide for their children .
AMY GOODMAN : Let ’ s go to a report from Reza Adib , an Afghan journalist and refugee locked down in the Malakasa camp outside Athens , Greece .
He investigated conditions in the camp for the BBC .
AMY GOODMAN : That report from the BBC .
In one @ @ @ @ @ @ @ live together , and seven people in the group tested positive for COVID-19 .
Adib spoke to Greek Migration Minister Notis Mitarachi about the findings .
AMY GOODMAN : Dr. Orcutt , if you can talk about what ’ s happening there in the refugee camps of Greece , and where people are coming from , and what Greece is doing ?
DR. MIRIAM ORCUTT : Well , the interesting thing with the response to COVID-19 in Greece has been that they have had quite a early lockdown for the whole of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ low cases among the general population , for the refugees and asylum seekers , who are both in camps on the mainland as well as on the Greek islands , the conditions within which they are quarantined , and have been quarantined actually for a longer period of time than the local community — the conditions are very substandard .
So , on the islands , for example , in Moria camp on Lesbos island , in just this one camp , there are individuals — over a thousand unaccompanied minors .
There @ @ @ @ @ @ @ elderly and those with underlying comorbidities , who aren ’ t able to shelter or self-isolate themselves in order to prevent COVID-19 .
And they ’ re also — if they did become unwell , the real concern is that they wouldn ’ t be able to access healthcare facilities .
Their access to health services is very much restricted , and there are limited capacity anyways for hospital beds and for intensive care beds .
Many of these individuals who have fled to Greece might have fled conflict situations from Afghanistan .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ from African countries .
And what we are concerned about is that , ultimately , if there are even a few cases within the camps , which are already very overcrowded , that there could really be quite a rapid and devastating spread , which could potentially go unnoticed and unknown at first , because there really isn ’ t a big enough testing strategy going on underway in the camps in Greece .
And what we need to see at this stage would be a massive scale-up in testing for all of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ when there are just one or two cases , because we know that COVID spreads even among those who are asymptomatic .
NERMEEN SHAIKH : Well , Dr. Orcutt , along those lines , I would like to ask about one of the most critical factors that determine the extent and speed of the spread of coronavirus , and that is , of course , population density .
We know very well ; we are broadcasting from New York City , which was and has been the epicenter of the outbreak .
But @ @ @ @ @ @ @ York City has a population density of about 10,000 people per square kilometer .
But by comparison , according to the International Rescue Committee , Cox ’ s Bazar , in TakaBangladesh , which we were speaking about in our earlier segment — in Cox ’ s Bazar , the density is between 40,000 and 70,000 people per square kilometer .
And in the Greek islands , which you were talking about earlier , in some camps in the Greek islands , population density is even higher , up to 200,000 people per @ @ @ @ @ @ @ talk about that specifically , and what camps present the most risk for the spread of the virus ?
DR. MIRIAM ORCUTT : Of course , as you mention , population density is a real concern .
And in Greece , one of the camps which is of most concern is Moria camp , which is the biggest refugee camp in Europe , where there are 20,000 people in a space which would only have a maximum capacity for 2,700 .
And why that is a concern , particularly for the camps where @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is that if multiple families are living within one tent and they ’ re sharing the same toilets between hundreds of people , then they ’ re not able — even if there is one person who becomes infected with COVID , they ’ re not able to self-isolate effectively .
They ’ re not able to protect themselves , but also they ’ re not able to protect others , including their family and the broader community .
And similarly with the very high densities and the informal tents that individuals are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Cox ’ s Bazar , really the concern is that a lot of these protective measures which we take in countries where we have the privilege to be able to isolate and protect ourselves , they just will not be able to take .
And beyond that , there are also more vulnerable populations within those camps — for example , the elderly , those who might have underlying conditions , or children — who really would need to , at this stage , be protected even more and have a way of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t experience the more severe complications , which we know do occur in those populations .
So , the real concern is that already the conditions are predisposing to a greater impact and a more rapid spread of COVID .
But also , I do think that there are , in the region — for example , in Bangladesh , there are many poor populations who also face challenges , and there is a argument for improving the healthcare system and the numbers of hospital beds and the intensive care capacity for all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ will ultimately improve and help the overall public health response for all of the populations , as well .
AMY GOODMAN : Very quickly , as we begin to wrap up , Dr. Miriam Orcutt , if you can also talk about deportations from the United States to places like Haiti and to Guatemala ?
You have refugees who are being deported who are COVID-19-positive .
Some are calling the United States “ the Wuhan of the Americas.
” If you can talk about what this means for the Americas and also jailed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ jailed migrants ?
Now we have migrants around the country who are on hunger strike .
We have the former ICE director , as well as so many human rights groups , calling for ICE to release the detainees .
DR. MIRIAM ORCUTT : Yes .
I mean , there are calls at the United Nations level , and have been for a number of months , around immediate release from detention due to — on public health grounds , due to the fact that a lot of the conditions within detention or @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are very overcrowded and often unhygienic .
And there really is a great risk that individuals who are deported during a public health crisis and the current pandemic are being deported to countries which have much weaker health systems and may not have an effective response in place .
So , again , the call from public health organizations is to suspend deportations .
There shouldn ’ t be deportations to other countries .
And also , the detention facilities , if they are being used , they should be either — at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ improved , but we are very much calling for release on public health grounds .
And there are other community mechanisms that have been proposed by the U.N. that governments can use .
AMY GOODMAN : Well , we want to thank you so much , Dr. Miriam Orcutt , senior research fellow in global public health , forced migration at the Institute for Global Health , University College London , UCL , and executive director of Lancet Migration .
When we come back , a new report ’ s out , finding @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the next six months from the secondary impacts of the pandemic — also , mothers imperiled .
We ’ ll speak with the scientist who led the report and an infectious disease pediatrician .
Stay with us .
AMY GOODMAN : “ Country Road ” by Paula Fuga and Jack Johnson , as part of the Kokua Festival 2020 in Hawaii , live from home .

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The Quarantine Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh, as we look now to the spread of the coronavirus across the globe and how it’s threatening the health and safety of tens of millions of refugees, from Bangladesh to Syria to Greece to the U.S.-Mexico border.
After weeks of warnings, COVID-19 cases are emerging in refugee camps, where social distancing is often impossible and healthcare extremely limited. Last month in Lebanon, a woman at a Palestinian refugee camp tested positive for the virus. In Greece, hundreds of asylum seekers, many from Africa, have contracted COVID-19.
For the estimated 5.6 million Syrian refugees in Lebanon, Jordan and Turkey, the threat of coronavirus also has led to a crisis of hunger, with the U.N. estimating 70% of refugees cannot afford food. This is a Syrian refugee, Abu Abdallah, speaking along with his wife, Umm Abdallah, from a camp in Lebanon’s Beqaa Valley.
ABU ABDALLAH: [translated] In the last few months, coronavirus has been worse than the war.
UMM ABDALLAH: [translated] At the beginning, during the war, it was not like this.
ABU ABDALLAH: [translated] It is worse than war, because during war you know who your enemy is, but now you don’t know where the disease is going to come from — from the air or from a person. War is easier. You know it is the person over there.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, for more, we’re going to Oxford, England, where we’re joined by Dr. Miriam Orcutt, senior research fellow in global public health and forced migration at the Institute for Global Health, University College London, and executive director of Lancet Migration.
We welcome you to Democracy Now! Can you start off by just giving us the scope and scale of the refugee crisis in the world? A tall order.
DR. MIRIAM ORCUTT: Thank you. Yes. Well, we know that currently the levels of forcibly displaced populations — that includes refugees, internally displaced and others — is at the highest levels ever recorded by the U.N. So, 70.8 million people around the world have been forcibly displaced. And actually, the highest number of those are internally displaced people, those who might have been forced to flee their homes from conflict, from violence or from persecution, who may be displaced multiple times within their own country even before they flee across international borders.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: And, Dr. Orcutt, as we mentioned in the introduction to the segment, 70% of Syrians — of course, Syrians constitute the largest number of refugees in the world — 70% of Syrian refugees in Lebanon report that they can’t afford food. If you could talk about that and also the fact that a large number of Syrian refugees are not only in Lebanon, but also in Turkey, which has seen a large outbreak, a significant outbreak, of COVID-19, even though now cases are reportedly declining?
DR. MIRIAM ORCUTT: Yes. For the Syrian displaced population in all the countries surrounding Syria, the context of COVID-19 has been a huge challenge and burden. Not only do many of them still live in informal settlements — so, a lot of them, even after seven or eight years, are living in tents. They don’t have access often to livelihood opportunities, so they can’t provide income for their families. And so they’re often dependent already, even pre-COVID, on humanitarian aid and food provision, and even running water provision, from outside. They’re not able to be self-sufficient.
So you can imagine, in both Lebanon and in Turkey, that people who are living in tents beside each other in very crowded and cramped conditions, who often share one toilet or one running water tap between many families, will have a real challenge to prevent the spread of COVID, but also just to maintain their basic standard of living during this public health crisis. And one of the things that we’ve seen, which is across the world but definitely within the countries surrounding Syria, is individuals who were already facing poverty now not being able to afford food, as you mentioned in your previous report, and not being able to provide for their children.
AMY GOODMAN: Let’s go to a report from Reza Adib, an Afghan journalist and refugee locked down in the Malakasa camp outside Athens, Greece. He investigated conditions in the camp for the BBC.
SAID REZA ADIB: The camp is in quarantine for 14 days. No one is allowed to go out, and no one is allowed to come in.
Mr. Karimi has just tested positive. Together with his family and friends, he’s told to quarantine in this disused schoolroom. With no taps or shower inside, they say they have to share with their neighbors. They are not happy. It risks spreading the virus.
REFUGEE: [translated] Look, the people with coronavirus. You see how close they are? For all of us, including those with coronavirus, there is only one tap.
AMY GOODMAN: That report from the BBC. In one building in the camp, 23 families live together, and seven people in the group tested positive for COVID-19. Adib spoke to Greek Migration Minister Notis Mitarachi about the findings.
NOTIS MITARACHI: This has not been reported to us by the International Organization of Migration, that manages the Malakasa camp. They haven’t told us that there is such a problem. I’m very happy you’re raising it. We will check.
AMY GOODMAN: Dr. Orcutt, if you can talk about what’s happening there in the refugee camps of Greece, and where people are coming from, and what Greece is doing?
DR. MIRIAM ORCUTT: Well, the interesting thing with the response to COVID-19 in Greece has been that they have had quite a early lockdown for the whole of the country. However, although they have low cases among the general population, for the refugees and asylum seekers, who are both in camps on the mainland as well as on the Greek islands, the conditions within which they are quarantined, and have been quarantined actually for a longer period of time than the local community — the conditions are very substandard.
So, on the islands, for example, in Moria camp on Lesbos island, in just this one camp, there are individuals — over a thousand unaccompanied minors. There are vulnerable people, such as the elderly and those with underlying comorbidities, who aren’t able to shelter or self-isolate themselves in order to prevent COVID-19. And they’re also — if they did become unwell, the real concern is that they wouldn’t be able to access healthcare facilities. Their access to health services is very much restricted, and there are limited capacity anyways for hospital beds and for intensive care beds.
Many of these individuals who have fled to Greece might have fled conflict situations from Afghanistan. There are also individuals who have fled from African countries. And what we are concerned about is that, ultimately, if there are even a few cases within the camps, which are already very overcrowded, that there could really be quite a rapid and devastating spread, which could potentially go unnoticed and unknown at first, because there really isn’t a big enough testing strategy going on underway in the camps in Greece. And what we need to see at this stage would be a massive scale-up in testing for all of the populations within the camps, even when there are just one or two cases, because we know that COVID spreads even among those who are asymptomatic.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Well, Dr. Orcutt, along those lines, I would like to ask about one of the most critical factors that determine the extent and speed of the spread of coronavirus, and that is, of course, population density. We know very well; we are broadcasting from New York City, which was and has been the epicenter of the outbreak. But in these refugee camps — and New York City has a population density of about 10,000 people per square kilometer. But by comparison, according to the International Rescue Committee, Cox’s Bazar, in TakaBangladesh, which we were speaking about in our earlier segment — in Cox’s Bazar, the density is between 40,000 and 70,000 people per square kilometer. And in the Greek islands, which you were talking about earlier, in some camps in the Greek islands, population density is even higher, up to 200,000 people per square kilometer. So, could you talk about that specifically, and what camps present the most risk for the spread of the virus?
DR. MIRIAM ORCUTT: Of course, as you mention, population density is a real concern. And in Greece, one of the camps which is of most concern is Moria camp, which is the biggest refugee camp in Europe, where there are 20,000 people in a space which would only have a maximum capacity for 2,700. And why that is a concern, particularly for the camps where people might be living in tents, is that if multiple families are living within one tent and they’re sharing the same toilets between hundreds of people, then they’re not able — even if there is one person who becomes infected with COVID, they’re not able to self-isolate effectively. They’re not able to protect themselves, but also they’re not able to protect others, including their family and the broader community. And similarly with the very high densities and the informal tents that individuals are living in, in Bangladesh, in Cox’s Bazar, really the concern is that a lot of these protective measures which we take in countries where we have the privilege to be able to isolate and protect ourselves, they just will not be able to take.
And beyond that, there are also more vulnerable populations within those camps — for example, the elderly, those who might have underlying conditions, or children — who really would need to, at this stage, be protected even more and have a way of being shielded so that they don’t experience the more severe complications, which we know do occur in those populations.
So, the real concern is that already the conditions are predisposing to a greater impact and a more rapid spread of COVID. But also, I do think that there are, in the region — for example, in Bangladesh, there are many poor populations who also face challenges, and there is a argument for improving the healthcare system and the numbers of hospital beds and the intensive care capacity for all of the population during COVID, which will ultimately improve and help the overall public health response for all of the populations, as well.
AMY GOODMAN: Very quickly, as we begin to wrap up, Dr. Miriam Orcutt, if you can also talk about deportations from the United States to places like Haiti and to Guatemala? You have refugees who are being deported who are COVID-19-positive. Some are calling the United States “the Wuhan of the Americas.” If you can talk about what this means for the Americas and also jailed migrants? What about the conditions of jailed migrants? Now we have migrants around the country who are on hunger strike. We have the former ICE director, as well as so many human rights groups, calling for ICE to release the detainees.
DR. MIRIAM ORCUTT: Yes. I mean, there are calls at the United Nations level, and have been for a number of months, around immediate release from detention due to — on public health grounds, due to the fact that a lot of the conditions within detention or reception facilities, likewise within jails, are very overcrowded and often unhygienic.
And there really is a great risk that individuals who are deported during a public health crisis and the current pandemic are being deported to countries which have much weaker health systems and may not have an effective response in place. So, again, the call from public health organizations is to suspend deportations. There shouldn’t be deportations to other countries.
And also, the detention facilities, if they are being used, they should be either — at least the basic overall conditions should be improved, but we are very much calling for release on public health grounds. And there are other community mechanisms that have been proposed by the U.N. that governments can use.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, we want to thank you so much, Dr. Miriam Orcutt, senior research fellow in global public health, forced migration at the Institute for Global Health, University College London, UCL, and executive director of Lancet Migration.
When we come back, a new report’s out, finding 1 million children under 5 could die in the next six months from the secondary impacts of the pandemic — also, mothers imperiled. We’ll speak with the scientist who led the report and an infectious disease pediatrician. Stay with us.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN: “Country Road” by Paula Fuga and Jack Johnson, as part of the Kokua Festival 2020 in Hawaii, live from home.


democracynow--2020-05-21--Crowded & Desperate: Rohingya in World's Largest Refugee Camp Face Dual Crises of Cyclone & COVID-19

This is a rush transcript .
Copy may not be in its final form .
AMY GOODMAN : Right now we ’ re going to turn directly to Bangladesh .
The most powerful storm to hit Bangladesh and India in 20 years made landfall Wednesday , displacing 3 million people and killing at least 20 , as COVID-19 cases in the region continue to rise .
Cyclone Amphan flooded streets and destroyed homes with more than 100-mile-per-hour winds throughout the night .
The storm weakened as it traveled across the coast of Bangladesh , but still unleashed heavy wind and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the world ’ s largest refugee camp , that ’ s home to 1 million Rohingya refugees living in crowded and often unsanitary conditions .
The climate change-fueled storm came just days after the first cases of COVID-19 were confirmed in Cox ’ s Bazar .
In a statement released last week , Dr. Shamim Jahan , Save the Children ’ s health director in Bangladesh , said , quote , “ Now that the virus has entered the world ’ s largest refugee settlement in Cox ’ s Bazar we are looking @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of people may die from COVID-19 .
… There are only an estimated 2,000 ventilators in all of Bangladesh , serving a population of 160 million people .
In the Rohingya refugee camps — home to nearly a million people — there are no intensive care beds at this moment , ” she said .
Well , for more , we ’ re going to the capital city of Bangladesh , to Dhaka , where we ’ re joined by Steve Corliss .
He ’ s the representative for the United Nations High @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with us , in London , is Tun Khin , who is a Rohingya activist and president of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK and a member of the Free Rohingya Coalition , born in Burma but in 1982 rendered effectively stateless along with a million other ethnic Rohingya under a new nationality law .
We welcome you both to Democracy Now !
Let ’ s begin in Bangladesh .
So , you have a million Rohingya , who fled from Burma to Bangladesh , now being hit by these two catastrophes .
One @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is the pandemic .
Steve Corliss , can you talk about what ’ s happening right now ?
Steve ?
Steve ?
Steve , can you hear me ?
OK , we ’ ll try to go to Steve — STEVEN CORLISS : OK. No , I think — is it better now ?
AMY GOODMAN : Yes , Steve , we hear you .
STEVEN CORLISS : OK.
I ’ m so sorry for the technical difficulty .
AMY GOODMAN : Steve Corliss , thanks so much for joining us .
Can @ @ @ @ @ @ @ right now in Bangladesh ?
STEVEN CORLISS : Yes .
As you said very well , I think , it was an emergency with another emergency layered on top of it .
And I think we ’ ve been quite fortunate in the last 24 hours that the impact of the cyclone on the camp was limited .
It passed quite far to the west .
Catastrophic impacts for Indians and Bangladeshis living in that region , but only in the camp we experienced limited flooding , the destruction of maybe 100 shelters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ So , we were well able to respond to it , but now we have to get back to the hard business of responding to the COVID-19 pandemic .
NERMEEN SHAIKH : Could you describe , for those who don ’ t know , what the conditions in Cox ’ s Bazar are ?
What are the conditions there ?
NERMEEN SHAIKH : And what are the concerns about how COVID-19 may spread ?
It was only last week that the first two cases , confirmed cases , were reported .
STEVEN CORLISS @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have a population of 860,000 refugees living in just over 20 square kilometers .
That ’ s equivalent to the population of Bhutan .
And the other thing to understand is , where they ’ re living was a forest reserve in August 2017 , when they first came to the country .
And from that forest preserve , an entire city has emerged .
But the crowding is remarkable .
The population density is twice what you ’ d find in Manhattan .
And we have to meet all of their needs @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fragile accommodation , I should also say .
That ’ s why we worry when cyclones come into the area , because they simply will not withstand high winds .
But in addition to building houses , we have to provide everything for them — water and sanitation facilities , healthcare facilities .
And now with the demands of the COVID19 pandemic , we ’ re racing against time to establish specific , dedicated isolation and treatment centers for the Rohingya refugees and the local Bangladeshis who will need it .
AMY GOODMAN @ @ @ @ @ @ @ join us from where you are in London ?
You ’ re president of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK .
You ’ ve just heard Steve Corliss on the ground in Bangladesh .
What are your major concerns ?
And for people to understand , why this massive refugee camp , the largest in the world , is even there to begin with ?
TUN KHIN : I think we need to look at why these people are there .
The first thing is , is that these are genocide survivors — Burmese @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , you know , destroying our community .
And in 2017 , there is about more than 800,000 Rohingya fled .
So , today , I think whatever happened here is quite responsible by Burmese government .
And we appreciate Bangladesh government giving us shelter .
I think there is much more needed to be done .
I mean , like aid groups and Bangladesh government , they are trying .
Whatever they can is very — we really appreciated all that .
But , you know , in Bangladesh , they are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
And , you know , this COVID-19 is a big danger ; another on top of that , this cyclone .
We can see that it ’ s not much — not much attack to the Bangladesh refugee camps ; it ’ s much more hit to the Bengal , you know , like Kolkata and others .
So , our deep sympathies to families and to the victims also .
You know , we are worrying that a bit now after this cyclone , there will be much .
You know @ @ @ @ @ @ @ no sanitation proper there .
A lot of difficulties of health issues will rise up , where we are facing the pandemic , COVID-19 , there , same time .
NERMEEN SHAIKH : Steven Corliss , in addition to what you ’ ve already described as the conditions in Cox ’ s Bazar , as well as what Tun Khin just said , the Bangladeshi government has also reportedly cut off access to the internet in Cox ’ s Bazar , and it ’ s also now reportedly very difficult to get SIM @ @ @ @ @ @ @ refugees there .
Could you explain why the Bangladeshi government did that and what the impact of that has been on letting people in the camp know about the risks of COVID19 and what they should be doing to protect themselves ?
STEVEN CORLISS : Thank you .
Thank you for the question .
The Bangladeshi government explains the basis for the policy as security concerns relating to the cross-border drugs trafficking and trade and other factors in the camp .
But it does create difficulties for the humanitarian operation and also for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ During a cyclone , for example , we need to be able to communicate with our teams in the field .
We also need the refugees , who are actually the backbone of the humanitarian response .
Refugee volunteers do virtually everything , particularly in a crisis situation .
They dig out people who are caught in landslides .
They find children who are separated from their families .
And they put them in touch with the international actors on the ground .
So , the lack of telecommunications is a barrier and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we do advocate for the restoration of the internet within the camp .
AMY GOODMAN : The United Nations ’ outgoing chief human rights monitor for Burma is calling for an investigation into allegations , Steve Corliss , of ongoing war crimes and crimes against humanity in Burma ’ s Rakhine and Chin states .
Can you talk about what ’ s happening with the Rohingya who are left in Burma right now , what we ’ re talking about , something like 600,000 ?
STEVEN CORLISS : Yeah .
Well , I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the situation on the other side of the border is there ’ s already an ongoing armed conflict that doesn ’ t directly involve the Rohingya , between the Arakan Army , which is an insurgent force representing Rakhine Buddhists in that area of the country , fighting against the national armed forces .
And the Rohingya in that area tend to be caught a bit in the crossfire there .
UNHCR has an office in Maungdaw .
We work on both sides of the border , because UNHCR ’ s job is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , to let them come to Bangladesh and make sure that they ’ re able to remain here until it ’ s safe for them to go home , but also to work on the other side of the border to create the conditions so that they could go back to the place they lived in the past .
And this is the first and most important thing to understand about every refugee , is that — and I think Tun Khin would agree with this — that , ultimately , they would @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in their own homes in Rakhine State in Myanmar when that ’ s possible .
NERMEEN SHAIKH : Tun Khin , in addition , you said , of course , it ’ s true that Cox ’ s Bazar has been spared the worst effects of this cyclone , but soon there will be the monsoon season in Bangladesh .
Can you explain what the effects of the monsoon have been in Cox ’ s Bazar , and what you expect to happen , if there have been any safety measures put in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : As far as what we know , normally , you know , monsoon , landslides and shelters being destroyed .
You know , the way how the camps were built up , there is not a kind of proper structural way .
So that is a big danger normally , and also the landslide can kill many people .
As far as what we know , there is thousands of people are still wrecks of that , landslides wrecks .
So , that is one thing we have to keep in our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we appreciate Bangladesh government and UNHCR and other aid agencies .
Whatever they can , they are doing their best .
But I want to bring up here that international community have to do much more to support Bangladesh and aid agencies to improve the situation .
So , Bangladesh have had repopulation Bangladesh alone , they can ’ t take on .
We appreciate they ’ re giving us shelter , but still , Bangladesh could do a lot .
Lifting up internet access and others , that would be very important @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to medical hospital and others , that is very important .
But we need to point out the international community should do more .
Rohingyas are one of the most vulnerable peoples on the Earth .
You know , that is critical condition now — COVID-19 pandemic , and we are looking at coming up monsoon rainy season , and already Amphan storm , gone away just yesterday , and many things can happen in very few days .
This is very important that international community should do much more .
We appreciate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to act seriously , not only supporting Bangladesh and supporting aid to Bangladesh and Rohingya refugees ; same time , international community should focus on pressuring Burmese government to restore the rights of the Rohingya , to protect them .
Genocide is still ongoing in Burma , where 600,000 Rohingyas ’ lives are still at risk in Burma .
So , we need to look at Burma is one of the most brutal military regime , and the government , they are continuously doing it .
That ’ s what we need to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ AMY GOODMAN : Tun Khin , we want to thank you so much for being with us , Rohingya activist , president of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation in U.K. , member of the Free Rohingya Coalition , born in Burma but in 1982 was rendered effectively stateless along with a million other ethnic Rohingya under a new nationality law .
And we want to thank Steve Corliss , speaking to us from Dhaka , Bangladesh , the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees representative in Bangladesh .
When we come back , we ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coronavirus is threatening the health and safety of tens of millions of refugees in camps and outside of camps across the globe .
Stay with us .

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: Right now we’re going to turn directly to Bangladesh. The most powerful storm to hit Bangladesh and India in 20 years made landfall Wednesday, displacing 3 million people and killing at least 20, as COVID-19 cases in the region continue to rise. Cyclone Amphan flooded streets and destroyed homes with more than 100-mile-per-hour winds throughout the night. The storm weakened as it traveled across the coast of Bangladesh, but still unleashed heavy wind and rains on Cox’s Bazar, the world’s largest refugee camp, that’s home to 1 million Rohingya refugees living in crowded and often unsanitary conditions.
The climate change-fueled storm came just days after the first cases of COVID-19 were confirmed in Cox’s Bazar. In a statement released last week, Dr. Shamim Jahan, Save the Children’s health director in Bangladesh, said, quote, “Now that the virus has entered the world’s largest refugee settlement in Cox’s Bazar we are looking at the very real prospect that thousands of people may die from COVID-19. … There are only an estimated 2,000 ventilators in all of Bangladesh, serving a population of 160 million people. In the Rohingya refugee camps — home to nearly a million people — there are no intensive care beds at this moment,” she said.
Well, for more, we’re going to the capital city of Bangladesh, to Dhaka, where we’re joined by Steve Corliss. He’s the representative for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Bangladesh. Also with us, in London, is Tun Khin, who is a Rohingya activist and president of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK and a member of the Free Rohingya Coalition, born in Burma but in 1982 rendered effectively stateless along with a million other ethnic Rohingya under a new nationality law.
We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Let’s begin in Bangladesh. So, you have a million Rohingya, who fled from Burma to Bangladesh, now being hit by these two catastrophes. One is the cyclone, and the other is the pandemic. Steve Corliss, can you talk about what’s happening right now? Steve? Steve? Steve, can you hear me? OK, we’ll try to go to Steve —
STEVEN CORLISS: OK. No, I think — is it better now?
AMY GOODMAN: Yes, Steve, we hear you.
STEVEN CORLISS: OK. I’m so sorry for the technical difficulty.
AMY GOODMAN: Steve Corliss, thanks so much for joining us. Can you respond to what’s happening right now in Bangladesh?
STEVEN CORLISS: Yes. As you said very well, I think, it was an emergency with another emergency layered on top of it. And I think we’ve been quite fortunate in the last 24 hours that the impact of the cyclone on the camp was limited. It passed quite far to the west. Catastrophic impacts for Indians and Bangladeshis living in that region, but only in the camp we experienced limited flooding, the destruction of maybe 100 shelters and the displacement of 400 people. So, we were well able to respond to it, but now we have to get back to the hard business of responding to the COVID-19 pandemic.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Could you describe, for those who don’t know, what the conditions in Cox’s Bazar are? What are the conditions there?
STEVEN CORLISS: Sure.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: And what are the concerns about how COVID-19 may spread? It was only last week that the first two cases, confirmed cases, were reported.
STEVEN CORLISS: So, you know, we have a population of 860,000 refugees living in just over 20 square kilometers. That’s equivalent to the population of Bhutan. And the other thing to understand is, where they’re living was a forest reserve in August 2017, when they first came to the country. And from that forest preserve, an entire city has emerged. But the crowding is remarkable. The population density is twice what you’d find in Manhattan.
And we have to meet all of their needs. They’re living in very fragile accommodation, I should also say. That’s why we worry when cyclones come into the area, because they simply will not withstand high winds. But in addition to building houses, we have to provide everything for them — water and sanitation facilities, healthcare facilities. And now with the demands of the COVID19 pandemic, we’re racing against time to establish specific, dedicated isolation and treatment centers for the Rohingya refugees and the local Bangladeshis who will need it.
AMY GOODMAN: Tun Khin, if you could join us from where you are in London? You’re president of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK. You’ve just heard Steve Corliss on the ground in Bangladesh. What are your major concerns? And for people to understand, why this massive refugee camp, the largest in the world, is even there to begin with?
TUN KHIN: I think we need to look at why these people are there. The first thing is, is that these are genocide survivors — Burmese military and government systematically for many decades, you know, destroying our community. And in 2017, there is about more than 800,000 Rohingya fled. So, today, I think whatever happened here is quite responsible by Burmese government.
And we appreciate Bangladesh government giving us shelter. I think there is much more needed to be done. I mean, like aid groups and Bangladesh government, they are trying. Whatever they can is very — we really appreciated all that. But, you know, in Bangladesh, they are living a kind of a squalid condition. And, you know, this COVID-19 is a big danger; another on top of that, this cyclone. We can see that it’s not much — not much attack to the Bangladesh refugee camps; it’s much more hit to the Bengal, you know, like Kolkata and others. So, our deep sympathies to families and to the victims also.
You know, we are worrying that a bit now after this cyclone, there will be much. You know, there is hygiene. There is no sanitation proper there. A lot of difficulties of health issues will rise up, where we are facing the pandemic, COVID-19, there, same time.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Steven Corliss, in addition to what you’ve already described as the conditions in Cox’s Bazar, as well as what Tun Khin just said, the Bangladeshi government has also reportedly cut off access to the internet in Cox’s Bazar, and it’s also now reportedly very difficult to get SIM cards, to get cellphones for Rohingya refugees there. Could you explain why the Bangladeshi government did that and what the impact of that has been on letting people in the camp know about the risks of COVID19 and what they should be doing to protect themselves?
STEVEN CORLISS: Thank you. Thank you for the question. The Bangladeshi government explains the basis for the policy as security concerns relating to the cross-border drugs trafficking and trade and other factors in the camp. But it does create difficulties for the humanitarian operation and also for the Rohingya refugees on the ground.
During a cyclone, for example, we need to be able to communicate with our teams in the field. We also need the refugees, who are actually the backbone of the humanitarian response. Refugee volunteers do virtually everything, particularly in a crisis situation. They dig out people who are caught in landslides. They find children who are separated from their families. And they put them in touch with the international actors on the ground. So, the lack of telecommunications is a barrier and is a constraint for us, and we do advocate for the restoration of the internet within the camp.
AMY GOODMAN: The United Nations’ outgoing chief human rights monitor for Burma is calling for an investigation into allegations, Steve Corliss, of ongoing war crimes and crimes against humanity in Burma’s Rakhine and Chin states. Can you talk about what’s happening with the Rohingya who are left in Burma right now, what we’re talking about, something like 600,000?
STEVEN CORLISS: Yeah. Well, I think the first thing to know about the situation on the other side of the border is there’s already an ongoing armed conflict that doesn’t directly involve the Rohingya, between the Arakan Army, which is an insurgent force representing Rakhine Buddhists in that area of the country, fighting against the national armed forces. And the Rohingya in that area tend to be caught a bit in the crossfire there.
UNHCR has an office in Maungdaw. We work on both sides of the border, because UNHCR’s job is to protect refugees, first of all, to let them come to Bangladesh and make sure that they’re able to remain here until it’s safe for them to go home, but also to work on the other side of the border to create the conditions so that they could go back to the place they lived in the past. And this is the first and most important thing to understand about every refugee, is that — and I think Tun Khin would agree with this — that, ultimately, they would want to be home and be safe in their own homes in Rakhine State in Myanmar when that’s possible.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Tun Khin, in addition, you said, of course, it’s true that Cox’s Bazar has been spared the worst effects of this cyclone, but soon there will be the monsoon season in Bangladesh. Can you explain what the effects of the monsoon have been in Cox’s Bazar, and what you expect to happen, if there have been any safety measures put in place since last summer?
TUN KHIN: As far as what we know, normally, you know, monsoon, landslides and shelters being destroyed. You know, the way how the camps were built up, there is not a kind of proper structural way. So that is a big danger normally, and also the landslide can kill many people. As far as what we know, there is thousands of people are still wrecks of that, landslides wrecks. So, that is one thing we have to keep in our mind.
And, you know, we appreciate Bangladesh government and UNHCR and other aid agencies. Whatever they can, they are doing their best. But I want to bring up here that international community have to do much more to support Bangladesh and aid agencies to improve the situation. So, Bangladesh have had repopulation Bangladesh alone, they can’t take on. We appreciate they’re giving us shelter, but still, Bangladesh could do a lot. Lifting up internet access and others, that would be very important. And also allowing them to get to medical hospital and others, that is very important. But we need to point out the international community should do more.
Rohingyas are one of the most vulnerable peoples on the Earth. You know, that is critical condition now — COVID-19 pandemic, and we are looking at coming up monsoon rainy season, and already Amphan storm, gone away just yesterday, and many things can happen in very few days. This is very important that international community should do much more. We appreciate the international community concern, but have to act seriously, not only supporting Bangladesh and supporting aid to Bangladesh and Rohingya refugees; same time, international community should focus on pressuring Burmese government to restore the rights of the Rohingya, to protect them. Genocide is still ongoing in Burma, where 600,000 Rohingyas’ lives are still at risk in Burma. So, we need to look at Burma is one of the most brutal military regime, and the government, they are continuously doing it. That’s what we need to look at also, same time.
AMY GOODMAN: Tun Khin, we want to thank you so much for being with us, Rohingya activist, president of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation in U.K., member of the Free Rohingya Coalition, born in Burma but in 1982 was rendered effectively stateless along with a million other ethnic Rohingya under a new nationality law. And we want to thank Steve Corliss, speaking to us from Dhaka, Bangladesh, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees representative in Bangladesh.
When we come back, we’ll look at how the spread of coronavirus is threatening the health and safety of tens of millions of refugees in camps and outside of camps across the globe. Stay with us.


democracynow--2020-05-21--Headlines for May 21, 2020

Headlines for May 21, 2020

In the United States , Columbia University disease modelers reported Wednesday that if states had begun social distancing measures just @ @ @ @ @ , 36,000 fewer people would have died of the coronavirus .
The Columbia report came @ @ @ @ @ responses to the growing outbreak in San Francisco and New York City led to a @ @ @ @ @ between the two cities .
San Francisco started to take action as early as January @ @ @ @ @ city to issue a shelter-in-place order beginning March 17 .
Mayor London Breed shared the @ @ @ @ @ New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio .
But New York Governor Andrew Cuomo dismissed @ @ @ @ @ idea of closing down the city and waited until March 22 to shut down the @ @ @ @ @ then the virus was rapidly spreading across New York .
The estimated death toll in @ @ @ @ @ at nearly 21,000 .
In San Francisco , just 36 people have died from the @ @

The World Health Organization’s director general warned Wednesday the COVID-19 pandemic has reached a grim new milestone, with worldwide confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus topping 5 million.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus: “In the last 24 hours, there have been 106,000 cases reported to WHO, the most in a single day since the outbreak began. Almost two-thirds of these cases were reported in just four countries.”
The United States tops the list — by far — with over 93,000 deaths and over a million and a half confirmed cases. The U.S. has the ninth worst fatality rate in the world, right next to Iran. Russia has the second-highest infection rate, with over 300,000 reported cases. Brazil, which recently surpassed the United Kingdom to become the third most affected nation, has emerged as the world’s largest coronavirus hot spot.


democracynow--2020-05-22--Mike Davis: Workers Face "Sophie's Choice" Between Income & Health as 50 States Reopen Amid Pandemic

This is a rush transcript .
Copy may not be in its final form .
AMY GOODMAN : All 50 states will at least be partially reopened this Memorial Day weekend , as the U.S. death toll from the COVID-19 outbreak will top 100,000 and some states prepare for a surge in cases .
We ’ re joined now by a guest who says , “ Reopening the Economy Will Send Us to Hell.
” Mike Davis is writer , historian , author of a number of books , including Planet of Slums , City of Quartz and The Monster @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Avian Flu .
His new book is Set the Night on Fire : L.A. in the Sixties .
He ’ s joining us from San Diego .
Thanks so much for being with us and staying all night up to do this interview , Mike .
Why don ’ t you start off with that very provocative headline of your piece , “ Reopening the Economy Will Send Us [ All ] to Hell.
” Why ?
MIKE DAVIS : I didn ’ t choose the headline .
But let me put @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lot of listeners will remember the novel by William Styron called Sophie ’ s Choice .
The movie version , Meryl Streep won the Academy Award for it .
But in the story , a young mother , Sophie , arrives at Auschwitz with her two small children , and she begs the sadistic Nazi doctor to spare their lives .
And he says , “ Well , I ’ ll spare one life , but you have to choose ; otherwise , I ’ ll kill them both.
” Americans , tens @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to make that choice or will soon make a choice like that .
The Washington Post poll of several weeks ago , where they polled people who were essential workers and have worked through the duration of the pandemic , and a third of them report that either they have a dangerous preexisting condition , or someone in their household has .
So , it is obscene and criminal that this choice , this impossible choice , between income for people who have to meet their mortgages , people who are desperate to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to choose to work and , on the other hand , bring disease home to the people you love , or to yourself .
This is , of course , a totally artificial situation .
Trump , of course , refused to use the Defense Production Act to compel the manufacture of protective masks and other gear , which other countries did with great success .
Taiwan , for instance , turned over to the military the production of the masks .
And in three weeks , they had increased production tenfold .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ had to leave it to a mad scramble to try and find private-sector suppliers .
Every hospital , every state , every city is competing with each other .
But now he ’ s used the Defense Production Act to force food processing workers back into plants , where they work in the cold , long hours , literally shoulder to shoulder , and where the infection rates are almost as high as nursing homes and prisons .
And why haven ’ t the Democrats , why haven ’ t we progressives , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ national campaign about workplace safety and the rejection of this idea that ordinary people have to do a kind of self-triage , them and their families ?
AMY GOODMAN : And yet , at the same time , you have massive corporations , like Amazon , billionaires in this country , who are making a massive killing now , a massive profit , increasing their wealth by some 15 % , the latest report from Institute for Policy Studies , Mike .
MIKE DAVIS : Well , I mean , we thought we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ countries in history .
But , of course , inequality will be far greater by the beginning of next year and next winter .
Ordinary Americans went to bed one night , and they woke up , looked out the door , and it was 1933 .
And the policies that are being pursued right now , of forcing people back to work , of using the threat of removing unemployment insurance , or of even prosecuting people who don ’ t go back to work because it ’ s unsafe , for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Texas , Iowa , Ohio , in states that put on these sites where employers can anonymously report workers who haven ’ t appeared for work , so that they ’ ll know that their unemployment should be cut off .
Public sector , local , state , county governments , who , like the rest of us , actually live in the moment , the — AMY GOODMAN : We just have a minute in this part of the interview , and then we ’ re continuing with Part 2 .
But @ @ @ @ @ @ @ no longer guarantee the survival of the human race .
Elaborate on that in this last minute .
MIKE DAVIS : OK .
In four ways , it ’ s become a threat to human survival .
It can ’ t guarantee food security or increase the output of food by the 50 % the United Nations says is necessary to feed humanity 20 years from now .
It no longer creates jobs or guarantees people income or a meaningful social role .
It can not decarbonize the economy or , at the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , which didn ’ t create the greenhouse gases , to make the great adaptations that are necessary for their survival .
And finally , we ’ re the midst of a revolution in biological design : genomics .
It can not translate this biological revolution , the enormous potential that exists now , into public health , either in this country and , of course , even less around the world .
AMY GOODMAN : I want to thank you for being with us .
Again , we ’ re going to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ interview with author and historian Mike Davis .
His new book , Set the Night on Fire : L.A. in the Sixties .
We will continue with Part 2 of our conversation , talking about socially distanced protests around the country .
A very special Happy Birthday to Mike DiFilippo !
That does it for our show .
And a deep appreciation for all the team that works around the country , working on this show .
I ’ m Amy Goodman .
Thanks so much for joining us .
Stay safe .

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: All 50 states will at least be partially reopened this Memorial Day weekend, as the U.S. death toll from the COVID-19 outbreak will top 100,000 and some states prepare for a surge in cases.
We’re joined now by a guest who says, “Reopening the Economy Will Send Us to Hell.” Mike Davis is writer, historian, author of a number of books, including Planet of Slums, City of Quartz and The Monster at Our Door: The Global Threat of Avian Flu. His new book is Set the Night on Fire: L.A. in the Sixties. He’s joining us from San Diego.
Thanks so much for being with us and staying all night up to do this interview, Mike. Why don’t you start off with that very provocative headline of your piece, “Reopening the Economy Will Send Us [All] to Hell.” Why?
MIKE DAVIS: I didn’t choose the headline. But let me put it this way. I think a lot of listeners will remember the novel by William Styron called Sophie’s Choice. The movie version, Meryl Streep won the Academy Award for it. But in the story, a young mother, Sophie, arrives at Auschwitz with her two small children, and she begs the sadistic Nazi doctor to spare their lives. And he says, “Well, I’ll spare one life, but you have to choose; otherwise, I’ll kill them both.” Americans, tens of millions of Americans, have had to make that choice or will soon make a choice like that.
The Washington Post poll of several weeks ago, where they polled people who were essential workers and have worked through the duration of the pandemic, and a third of them report that either they have a dangerous preexisting condition, or someone in their household has. So, it is obscene and criminal that this choice, this impossible choice, between income for people who have to meet their mortgages, people who are desperate to put food on their table, and to choose to work and, on the other hand, bring disease home to the people you love, or to yourself. This is, of course, a totally artificial situation.
Trump, of course, refused to use the Defense Production Act to compel the manufacture of protective masks and other gear, which other countries did with great success. Taiwan, for instance, turned over to the military the production of the masks. And in three weeks, they had increased production tenfold. But here, of course, we had to leave it to a mad scramble to try and find private-sector suppliers. Every hospital, every state, every city is competing with each other. But now he’s used the Defense Production Act to force food processing workers back into plants, where they work in the cold, long hours, literally shoulder to shoulder, and where the infection rates are almost as high as nursing homes and prisons.
And why haven’t the Democrats, why haven’t we progressives, starting in March, have launched a national campaign about workplace safety and the rejection of this idea that ordinary people have to do a kind of self-triage, them and their families?
AMY GOODMAN: And yet, at the same time, you have massive corporations, like Amazon, billionaires in this country, who are making a massive killing now, a massive profit, increasing their wealth by some 15%, the latest report from Institute for Policy Studies, Mike.
MIKE DAVIS: Well, I mean, we thought we lived in one of the most unequal countries in history. But, of course, inequality will be far greater by the beginning of next year and next winter. Ordinary Americans went to bed one night, and they woke up, looked out the door, and it was 1933. And the policies that are being pursued right now, of forcing people back to work, of using the threat of removing unemployment insurance, or of even prosecuting people who don’t go back to work because it’s unsafe, for unemployment fraud — the fact that in Texas, Iowa, Ohio, in states that put on these sites where employers can anonymously report workers who haven’t appeared for work, so that they’ll know that their unemployment should be cut off. Public sector, local, state, county governments, who, like the rest of us, actually live in the moment, the —
AMY GOODMAN: Mike?
MIKE DAVIS: — evidence — yes.
AMY GOODMAN: We just have a minute in this part of the interview, and then we’re continuing with Part 2. But you have said that global capitalism can no longer guarantee the survival of the human race. Elaborate on that in this last minute.
MIKE DAVIS: OK. In four ways, it’s become a threat to human survival. It can’t guarantee food security or increase the output of food by the 50% the United Nations says is necessary to feed humanity 20 years from now. It no longer creates jobs or guarantees people income or a meaningful social role. It cannot decarbonize the economy or, at the same time, allow the poor countries, which didn’t create the greenhouse gases, to make the great adaptations that are necessary for their survival. And finally, we’re the midst of a revolution in biological design: genomics. It cannot translate this biological revolution, the enormous potential that exists now, into public health, either in this country and, of course, even less around the world.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you for being with us. Again, we’re going to post immediately today Part 2 of our interview with author and historian Mike Davis. His new book, Set the Night on Fire: L.A. in the Sixties. We will continue with Part 2 of our conversation, talking about socially distanced protests around the country.
A very special Happy Birthday to Mike DiFilippo! That does it for our show. And a deep appreciation for all the team that works around the country, working on this show. I’m Amy Goodman. Thanks so much for joining us. Stay safe.


democracynow--2020-05-22--"Diarrhea, Dehydration, Hunger, Exhaustion": India's Rural Poor Suffer Most Under Lockdown

This is a rush transcript .
Copy may not be in its final form .
AMY GOODMAN : This is Democracy Now !
, democracynow.org , The Quarantine Report .
I ’ m Amy Goodman , as we turn to India , which is starting to loosen its nationwide lockdown and just saw its biggest spike in coronavirus cases in 24 hours with 6,000 new reported infections .
India , a country of 1.3 billion people , has reported more than 118,000 confirmed cases , more than 3,500 deaths .
This comes as the most powerful cyclone to strike eastern @ @ @ @ @ @ @ killed at least 82 people this week , forced an estimated 3 million people to leave their homes to seek shelter .
Meanwhile , a nationwide strike is underway today by many of India ’ s trade unions against the suspension of labor laws .
Since the lockdown began in March , tens of thousands of migrant workers have been left jobless , face dangerous journeys to return home to smaller villages across India , most of them by foot .
Hundreds have already lost their lives en route home .
This is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Well , for more , we go to Mumbai , India , where we ’ re joined by the award-winning Indian journalist P. Sainath .
He ’ s the founder of People ’ s Archive of Rural India , or PARI , which focuses on rural India , where more than 833 million people live , speaking 780 living languages .
But first , I want to play part of an interview by PARI with 11-year-old Paras Madikar .
After the lockdown , his father lost his job as a driver , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his family make money .
AMY GOODMAN : That ’ s an interview by PARI , the People ’ s Archive of Rural India .
For more , we ’ re joined by its founder , journalist P. Sainath .
He ’ s also author of Everybody Loves a Good Drought : Stories from India ’ s Poorest Districts .
Welcome to Democracy Now !
It ’ s so important to have you with us , Sainath , such an honor .
P. SAINATH : My pleasure .
Thank you .
AMY GOODMAN @ @ @ @ @ @ @ off by talking about this boy , and even the founding of your archive , the kind of journalism you ’ re doing now ?
You were a well-known , major journalist , a mainstream journalist , but you felt that the people on the ground , the majority of India , were not being covered , their voices not heard .
P. SAINATH : Well , the average Indian national daily gives 0.67 % of its front page for news of rural origin , where 69 % of the population live .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ a single newspaper , not a single national newspaper , not a single TV channel that has a national-level rural affairs editor or correspondent full-time , nor is there a full-time correspondent on the farming beat , nor is there a full-time correspondent on the labor beat .
So , obviously , that gap is very huge .
And we try filling it .
But I ’ d like to answer your thing about the boy , Paras Madikar .
He was at school .
He had never been a child laborer before @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , his father lost his job .
His mother lost her job .
Amy , according to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy , India lost 122 million jobs in the single month of April — OK ?
— at an unemployment rate of 27.1 % , now down to 24 % , 25 % — 122 million jobs .
And those were nonfarm-sector jobs , like his father , who was a watchman , a Chowkidar , a security guard in a building ; like his mother , who was a cook @ @ @ @ @ @ @ went .
Ninety-one-point-three million of those jobs — mind you , the 122 million jobs is three times what you ’ ve lost in the United States .
The 91.3 million were people who were small vendors , hawkers , tiny little stores , mom-and-pop stores , whatever .
These are the ones that have got out .
Many of those jobs are not coming back .
Paras Madikar , that boy , he is one of those children who was thrown onto the streets to earn something , because his school shut @ @ @ @ @ @ @ get the midday meal anymore .
Right ?
But it ’ s also very important for you to look at the large picture of what ’ s happening to these migrants .
And it ’ s not just the migrants who are in trouble .
You know , I think that COVID-19 has presented us — and , I think , much of the world — with a complete and total autopsy of the corpse of neoliberal policy of 28 years in India .
Yeah .
I think it ’ s done the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ now know how fragile large sections of the population are , after all the boasting about 8 % growth and 9 % growth and stuff .
Yeah ?
There are , I mean — and it also gives us a pretty good brain scan of neoliberal thinking .
On last Sunday , the government of India passed an order .
You saw that long march of the migrants , right ?
The government of India passed an order for a nationwide curfew between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m. You know what that does @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the millions of people on the highway ?
Yeah ?
It means that they can only now march hundreds , thousands , I mean , anywhere — they ’ re marching anywhere between 300 and 1,000 miles , Amy .
And these people now can only march between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. in temperatures ranging — you know , in temperatures ranging from 103 to 110 degrees Fahrenheit .
That ’ s what the marchers are now — the people on the highways are now doing .
Imagine that kind of thinking @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that is neoliberal thinking .
It makes rules to protect the beautiful people , and it has no part for the marginalized .
Look at how it ’ s thinking on hunger .
We have not , in living memory , seen this kind of immediate , urgent hunger on the streets as has been happening here .
This country is sitting on what the government says is 77 million tons of surplus food grain .
I don ’ t call — I don ’ t use the word “ surplus ” ; @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
But it has 77 million tons of buffer stock .
You know what it ’ s doing with that stock ?
It ’ s given permission — the government has issued permission last month to convert large portions of rice — I don ’ t know how many million tons — into ethanol , so that you can create large quantities of hand sanitizer .
OK ?
You ’ re destroying food grain to create hand sanitizer , which also involves large-scale use of water .
Yeah ?
And , of course @ @ @ @ @ @ @ blend petrol for fuel .
I mean , this is the level of thinking when people are so hungry , when people are actually on the edge of starvation .
We now know , after 28 years of this path of development , how narrow is the distance , how minimal the distance , between insecurity and hunger , and hunger and starvation .
The other thing they ’ ve done — oh , what ’ s the great thing that the states have done in response to this hunger and chaos and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ know what ’ s one of the first things to reopen , even before the so-called relaxation of the lockdown ?
Thousands and thousands of liquor shops .
Maybe , you know , we ’ re being advised that you go on a liquid diet .
I don ’ t know .
But you have opened thousands of liquor shops .
And the queues for those can be up to two kilometers , making a mockery of all the physical distancing stuff .
But this is the way we are thinking .
This @ @ @ @ @ @ @ So , it ’ s really — I mean , you ’ ve lost 122 million jobs .
People are terribly hungry .
You have 77 million tons of grain piled up , and you ’ re thinking of creating ethanol from it .
So , we really are — the migrants and others also are in a terrible , terrible state .
I also want to say that it ’ s not just the migrants .
OK ?
See , we , in the People ’ s Archive of Rural India , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on March 26th after the lockdown , like the rest of the corporate media did .
We cover them 365 days a year .
OK ?
We know who they are .
We know them personally .
As you said when you were introducing the subject , that — you know , you got a guy to say that “ We are being beaten .
We are running out of water .
We are running out of food.
” Amy , those — earlier , when migrants walked — they did walk long @ @ @ @ @ @ @ home — they would have tea stalls , little bus stands and stuff along the way , where they would stop , work for the evening , earn their way to the next 40 , 50 kilometers , earn their way to the next 60 kilometers , to the next bus stand , where they would work in a tea stall .
All those tea stalls and restaurants on the highway are now closed under the lockdown .
So you ’ re going to have a lot of deaths from non-COVID ailments , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , hunger , exhaustion .
These sort of things are happening .
You know , let me give you one example .
One example , the case of young Jamlo , a 12-year-old girl , Indigenous person , who had gone with a party of people from her village — not her parents , but with others — to work in the chili fields , in the red chili fields of the neighboring state of Telangana .
When the lockdown came and everyone was thrown off their jobs and their work , Jamlo @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , she walked 140 kilometers in three days .
I spend a hell of a lot of my time walking about the countryside .
I ’ ve never done 140 kilometers in three days and nights .
And she fell dead 60 kilometers from her home , in exhaustion and from muscle fatigue .
OK ?
How many Jamlos have we now condemned the migrants to , when we bring in a curfew that says you can only , individuals — movement of individuals is strictly forbidden between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m. @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pushing over the edge ?
The entire process of what ’ s going on is so utterly barbarous and , you know , shows what we have made of people .
Do you know — let me tell you a little aside about the 77 million tons of food .
Do you know how much that is , Amy , in the kind of bags we pack it ?
If economists , like Jean Drèze , calculated 15 years ago — because we ’ ve had that surplus for more than 15 , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ million tons of food grain , if the sacks were laid in a row , you could reach the moon and back twice .
It ’ s twice the distance to the moon .
So you could go and come back , and you would still have some more grain left over .
Yeah ?
You could easily , if you chose , meet the people ’ s hunger .
You could do that .
No , but the food distribution system under neoliberalism has not functioned — the stocks have not functioned @ @ @ @ @ @ @ functioning to keep prices up .
P. SAINATH : You have — yeah ?
Please .
AMY GOODMAN : So , talk about what this means right now for India today .
And also , if you can talk about the — you can talk about the prejudice , the racism being expressed , trying to use the pandemic against Muslims in India and against Chinese Indians ?
P. SAINATH : Yeah .
Well , it ’ s not just Chinese Indians , but all people from the northeast who look Chinese to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
But two things have been happening .
I do understand that there has been racism , that there has been sectarian propaganda in many parts of the world , not the least in the United States , where you had the great “ kung flu , ” right ?
But I do not believe anywhere else it ’ s at this level of communal , sectarian prejudice , where television channels don ’ t cover the coronavirus , but cover said suspected Islamic conspiracies that planted it here , because there was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , a religious gathering in Delhi , which turned out to be a super spreader .
But there were many other events by other religions and other groups , etc.
, but this was an identified one .
And there are millions of people receiving WhatsApp messages in multiple languages telling them — you know , say , quoting a district judge — of course , a retired district judge , who can ’ t be traced — and there seem to be so many of them , because they seem to be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ whole thing was planned by Islamic groups to devastate India , Hindu India .
OK ?
That ’ s one .
Second , fishermen in the east coast — and I want to make this point to your audience , Amy .
Today we are listening about the migrants .
There are millions of relatives of those migrants back in the villages they ’ re going .
They are no less devastated .
Yeah , the migrants are having it physically worse .
But millions of livelihoods across the country were smashed by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lockdown .
Fishermen in the east coast of Andhra Pradesh , my home state , they are — you know , there is , anyway , a fishing ban between April 15 and June 14 to conserve fish stock , because that ’ s the breeding season for the fish , now , which means that the two weeks preceding that are the heaviest fishing period .
OK ?
Those couldn ’ t happen because of the lockdown .
And then , when the poor fishermen steal out at 2 a.m. , 3 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ risk of their lives , and bring back a few fish to eat , they ’ re not able to sell the rest .
Either they sell it at one-fourth the price , or they ’ re told by customers , “ Hey , we have seen on WhatsApp that these fish are from the east .
They ’ re from China .
And they ’ ve got — they ’ re carrying the coronavirus.
” OK ?
I mean , it is funny , but it is so bloody widely accepted .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ have a minute , and I wanted to go to your comment that COVID-19 presents us with a complete and thorough autopsy of 28 years of neoliberalism in India .
Your final comment ?
P. SAINATH : Yeah .
Well , one , as I said , it ’ s shown us what these policies on food — it ’ s like , for instance , for 35 years , we ’ ve all accepted — right ?
— that healthcare is something to be bought , sold , traded , and that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ neoliberalism .
We have a country where the maximum amount of the health system is in private hands — I mean , where the maximum expenditure on health is from poor people , from their own pockets .
That ’ s one , on the health .
On the education system , now what happens — all the rich schools and the colleges and private universities will switch to “ online education.
” What happens to the tens of millions of children ?
What happens to the tens of millions of children in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to have a decent blackboard ?
What happens to that ?
So the education system is smashed .
This was also the pushing of so-called affordable private schools .
All this stuff came with neoliberalism .
So we ’ ve been smashed on the hunger front , on the education front , on the health front .
And we now face a very serious crisis in the coming monsoon crop season , because after 25 years we promoted , like anything , cash crop for exports .
If we repeat cash crops in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ going to have starvation , right ?
Because worldwide , as you know , income and consumption growth — income and consumption growth have crashed .
Nobody is going to have huge orders of sugarcane and cotton .
That ’ s not going to happen .
Even the previous season ’ s stocks are piling up .
I have been — we are desperate in People ’ s Archive of Rural India , appealing to farmers , “ Grow only food crop , or you and your families are in very serious trouble.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ farmers and laborers .
Each and every node of neoliberalism is now standing naked .
Many of these things happened earlier , OK ?
P. SAINATH : They were not brought on by the coronavirus .
Yeah .
They were not brought on by the coronavirus .
They were brought on by conscious policy that this is how we should build a society .
So , these things existed earlier , but now we can ’ t turn away from them .
We can ’ t pretend we don ’ t see .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ want to thank you so much for being with us , award-winning Indian journalist and founder of People ’ s Archive of Rural India .
We thank you for being there .
We ’ re going to link to your online website , and we hope to have you back very soon .
The largest lockdown in world history is taking place right now in India .
This is Democracy Now !
When we come back , Mike Davis .
Stay with us .

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The Quarantine Report. I’m Amy Goodman, as we turn to India, which is starting to loosen its nationwide lockdown and just saw its biggest spike in coronavirus cases in 24 hours with 6,000 new reported infections. India, a country of 1.3 billion people, has reported more than 118,000 confirmed cases, more than 3,500 deaths. This comes as the most powerful cyclone to strike eastern India and Bangladesh in over a decade killed at least 82 people this week, forced an estimated 3 million people to leave their homes to seek shelter.
Meanwhile, a nationwide strike is underway today by many of India’s trade unions against the suspension of labor laws. Since the lockdown began in March, tens of thousands of migrant workers have been left jobless, face dangerous journeys to return home to smaller villages across India, most of them by foot. Hundreds have already lost their lives en route home. This is a migrant worker.
MIGRANT WORKER: [translated] Our employers threatened us when we went to ask for help. They said, “Do whatever you like. We don’t care.” Our families are really worried. They’ve been calling us over and over for days. We don’t have any food or water here. On the contrary, we are being beaten when we ask for it.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, for more, we go to Mumbai, India, where we’re joined by the award-winning Indian journalist P. Sainath. He’s the founder of People’s Archive of Rural India, or PARI, which focuses on rural India, where more than 833 million people live, speaking 780 living languages. But first, I want to play part of an interview by PARI with 11-year-old Paras Madikar. After the lockdown, his father lost his job as a driver, and the boy began selling vegetables to help his family make money.
PARAS MADIKAR: [translated] At 5:30 every morning, I go and get whatever vegetables I can find. And then I have to sell it. Those who want to buy, they buy it. Many people buy vegetables. Many don’t. I get very little time to study. I find little time in the morning. In the afternoon, after eating lunch, I again study for some time. I like going to school very much. My neck is hurting.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s an interview by PARI, the People’s Archive of Rural India.
For more, we’re joined by its founder, journalist P. Sainath. He’s also author of Everybody Loves a Good Drought: Stories from India’s Poorest Districts.
Welcome to Democracy Now! It’s so important to have you with us, Sainath, such an honor.
P. SAINATH: My pleasure. Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: If you can talk — start off by talking about this boy, and even the founding of your archive, the kind of journalism you’re doing now? You were a well-known, major journalist, a mainstream journalist, but you felt that the people on the ground, the majority of India, were not being covered, their voices not heard.
P. SAINATH: Well, the average Indian national daily gives 0.67% of its front page for news of rural origin, where 69% of the population live. So, obviously — there is not a single newspaper, not a single national newspaper, not a single TV channel that has a national-level rural affairs editor or correspondent full-time, nor is there a full-time correspondent on the farming beat, nor is there a full-time correspondent on the labor beat. So, obviously, that gap is very huge. And we try filling it.
But I’d like to answer your thing about the boy, Paras Madikar. He was at school. He had never been a child laborer before. When they shut down the school, his father lost his job. His mother lost her job. Amy, according to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy, India lost 122 million jobs in the single month of April — OK? — at an unemployment rate of 27.1%, now down to 24%, 25% — 122 million jobs. And those were nonfarm-sector jobs, like his father, who was a watchman, a Chowkidar, a security guard in a building; like his mother, who was a cook in a canteen. All these jobs went. Ninety-one-point-three million of those jobs — mind you, the 122 million jobs is three times what you’ve lost in the United States. The 91.3 million were people who were small vendors, hawkers, tiny little stores, mom-and-pop stores, whatever. These are the ones that have got out. Many of those jobs are not coming back. Paras Madikar, that boy, he is one of those children who was thrown onto the streets to earn something, because his school shut down, and you don’t get the midday meal anymore. Right?
But it’s also very important for you to look at the large picture of what’s happening to these migrants. And it’s not just the migrants who are in trouble. You know, I think that COVID-19 has presented us — and, I think, much of the world — with a complete and total autopsy of the corpse of neoliberal policy of 28 years in India. Yeah. I think it’s done the same elsewhere for other countries. We now know how fragile large sections of the population are, after all the boasting about 8% growth and 9% growth and stuff. Yeah?
There are, I mean — and it also gives us a pretty good brain scan of neoliberal thinking. On last Sunday, the government of India passed an order. You saw that long march of the migrants, right? The government of India passed an order for a nationwide curfew between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m. You know what that does to the migrants on the highway, the millions of people on the highway? Yeah? It means that they can only now march hundreds, thousands, I mean, anywhere — they’re marching anywhere between 300 and 1,000 miles, Amy. And these people now can only march between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. in temperatures ranging — you know, in temperatures ranging from 103 to 110 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s what the marchers are now — the people on the highways are now doing. Imagine that kind of thinking. Imagine the kind of — and that is neoliberal thinking. It makes rules to protect the beautiful people, and it has no part for the marginalized.
Look at how it’s thinking on hunger. We have not, in living memory, seen this kind of immediate, urgent hunger on the streets as has been happening here. This country is sitting on what the government says is 77 million tons of surplus food grain. I don’t call — I don’t use the word “surplus”; I think that’s a fraud. But it has 77 million tons of buffer stock. You know what it’s doing with that stock? It’s given permission — the government has issued permission last month to convert large portions of rice — I don’t know how many million tons — into ethanol, so that you can create large quantities of hand sanitizer. OK? You’re destroying food grain to create hand sanitizer, which also involves large-scale use of water. Yeah? And, of course, that ethanol will also go to blend petrol for fuel. I mean, this is the level of thinking when people are so hungry, when people are actually on the edge of starvation. We now know, after 28 years of this path of development, how narrow is the distance, how minimal the distance, between insecurity and hunger, and hunger and starvation.
The other thing they’ve done — oh, what’s the great thing that the states have done in response to this hunger and chaos and marches? We have reopened. You know what’s one of the first things to reopen, even before the so-called relaxation of the lockdown? Thousands and thousands of liquor shops. Maybe, you know, we’re being advised that you go on a liquid diet. I don’t know. But you have opened thousands of liquor shops. And the queues for those can be up to two kilometers, making a mockery of all the physical distancing stuff. But this is the way we are thinking. This is the way we are behaving. So, it’s really — I mean, you’ve lost 122 million jobs. People are terribly hungry. You have 77 million tons of grain piled up, and you’re thinking of creating ethanol from it. So, we really are — the migrants and others also are in a terrible, terrible state.
I also want to say that it’s not just the migrants. OK? See, we, in the People’s Archive of Rural India, we didn’t discover labor migrants on March 26th after the lockdown, like the rest of the corporate media did. We cover them 365 days a year. OK? We know who they are. We know them personally. As you said when you were introducing the subject, that — you know, you got a guy to say that “We are being beaten. We are running out of water. We are running out of food.” Amy, those — earlier, when migrants walked — they did walk long distances, even earlier, to go home — they would have tea stalls, little bus stands and stuff along the way, where they would stop, work for the evening, earn their way to the next 40, 50 kilometers, earn their way to the next 60 kilometers, to the next bus stand, where they would work in a tea stall. All those tea stalls and restaurants on the highway are now closed under the lockdown. So you’re going to have a lot of deaths from non-COVID ailments, old Indian friends like diarrhea, dehydration, hunger, exhaustion. These sort of things are happening.
You know, let me give you one example. One example, the case of young Jamlo, a 12-year-old girl, Indigenous person, who had gone with a party of people from her village — not her parents, but with others — to work in the chili fields, in the red chili fields of the neighboring state of Telangana. When the lockdown came and everyone was thrown off their jobs and their work, Jamlo walked 140 kilometers. A 12-year-old girl, she walked 140 kilometers in three days. I spend a hell of a lot of my time walking about the countryside. I’ve never done 140 kilometers in three days and nights. And she fell dead 60 kilometers from her home, in exhaustion and from muscle fatigue. OK? How many Jamlos have we now condemned the migrants to, when we bring in a curfew that says you can only, individuals — movement of individuals is strictly forbidden between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m.? How many more Jamlos are we pushing over the edge? The entire process of what’s going on is so utterly barbarous and, you know, shows what we have made of people.
Do you know — let me tell you a little aside about the 77 million tons of food. Do you know how much that is, Amy, in the kind of bags we pack it? If economists, like Jean Drèze, calculated 15 years ago — because we’ve had that surplus for more than 15, 20 years — that if the 77 million tons of food grain, if the sacks were laid in a row, you could reach the moon and back twice. It’s twice the distance to the moon. So you could go and come back, and you would still have some more grain left over. Yeah? You could easily, if you chose, meet the people’s hunger. You could do that. No, but the food distribution system under neoliberalism has not functioned — the stocks have not functioned to keep prices low. They are functioning to keep prices up.
AMY GOODMAN: So —
P. SAINATH: You have — yeah? Please.
AMY GOODMAN: So, talk about what this means right now for India today. And also, if you can talk about the — you can talk about the prejudice, the racism being expressed, trying to use the pandemic against Muslims in India and against Chinese Indians?
P. SAINATH: Yeah. Well, it’s not just Chinese Indians, but all people from the northeast who look Chinese to, you know, so-called mainstream India. But two things have been happening. I do understand that there has been racism, that there has been sectarian propaganda in many parts of the world, not the least in the United States, where you had the great “kung flu,” right?
But I do not believe anywhere else it’s at this level of communal, sectarian prejudice, where television channels don’t cover the coronavirus, but cover said suspected Islamic conspiracies that planted it here, because there was an event by a small fundamentalist group, a religious gathering in Delhi, which turned out to be a super spreader. But there were many other events by other religions and other groups, etc., but this was an identified one. And there are millions of people receiving WhatsApp messages in multiple languages telling them — you know, say, quoting a district judge — of course, a retired district judge, who can’t be traced — and there seem to be so many of them, because they seem to be in all languages — about how this whole thing was planned by Islamic groups to devastate India, Hindu India. OK? That’s one.
Second, fishermen in the east coast — and I want to make this point to your audience, Amy. Today we are listening about the migrants. There are millions of relatives of those migrants back in the villages they’re going. They are no less devastated. Yeah, the migrants are having it physically worse. But millions of livelihoods across the country were smashed by the way we organized and implemented our lockdown. Fishermen in the east coast of Andhra Pradesh, my home state, they are — you know, there is, anyway, a fishing ban between April 15 and June 14 to conserve fish stock, because that’s the breeding season for the fish, now, which means that the two weeks preceding that are the heaviest fishing period. OK? Those couldn’t happen because of the lockdown. And then, when the poor fishermen steal out at 2 a.m., 3 a.m. in the morning, at the risk of their lives, and bring back a few fish to eat, they’re not able to sell the rest. Either they sell it at one-fourth the price, or they’re told by customers, “Hey, we have seen on WhatsApp that these fish are from the east. They’re from China. And they’ve got — they’re carrying the coronavirus.” OK? I mean, it is funny, but it is so bloody widely accepted.
AMY GOODMAN: Sainath, we only have a minute, and I wanted to go to your comment that COVID-19 presents us with a complete and thorough autopsy of 28 years of neoliberalism in India. Your final comment?
P. SAINATH: Yeah. Well, one, as I said, it’s shown us what these policies on food — it’s like, for instance, for 35 years, we’ve all accepted — right? — that healthcare is something to be bought, sold, traded, and that health insurance equals health. This is neoliberalism. We have a country where the maximum amount of the health system is in private hands — I mean, where the maximum expenditure on health is from poor people, from their own pockets. That’s one, on the health.
On the education system, now what happens — all the rich schools and the colleges and private universities will switch to “online education.” What happens to the tens of millions of children? What happens to the tens of millions of children in government schools where you’re lucky to have a decent blackboard? What happens to that? So the education system is smashed. This was also the pushing of so-called affordable private schools. All this stuff came with neoliberalism. So we’ve been smashed on the hunger front, on the education front, on the health front.
And we now face a very serious crisis in the coming monsoon crop season, because after 25 years we promoted, like anything, cash crop for exports. If we repeat cash crops in the coming season, you’re going to have starvation, right? Because worldwide, as you know, income and consumption growth — income and consumption growth have crashed. Nobody is going to have huge orders of sugarcane and cotton. That’s not going to happen. Even the previous season’s stocks are piling up. I have been — we are desperate in People’s Archive of Rural India, appealing to farmers, “Grow only food crop, or you and your families are in very serious trouble.” So, that’s with farmers and laborers.
Each and every node of neoliberalism is now standing naked. Many of these things happened earlier, OK?
AMY GOODMAN: We have 20 seconds.
P. SAINATH: They were not brought on by the coronavirus. Yeah. They were not brought on by the coronavirus. They were brought on by conscious policy that this is how we should build a society. So, these things existed earlier, but now we can’t turn away from them. We can’t pretend we don’t see.
AMY GOODMAN: P. Sainath, we want to thank you so much for being with us, award-winning Indian journalist and founder of People’s Archive of Rural India. We thank you for being there. We’re going to link to your online website, and we hope to have you back very soon. The largest lockdown in world history is taking place right now in India.
This is Democracy Now! When we come back, Mike Davis. Stay with us.


democracynow--2020-05-22--FBI Says It Will Investigate Breonna Taylor Shooting Death as Police Chief Announces Retirement

This is a rush transcript .
Copy may not be in its final form .
AMY GOODMAN : Ben Crump , I wanted to end with another case .
You ’ re also representing the family of Breonna Taylor , a 26-year-old aspiring nurse , who was shot to death by police inside her own apartment .
Her family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the Louisville Metro Police Department , the lawsuit detailing how police shot Taylor at least eight times after they burst into her apartment , unannounced , with a search warrant .
The man police @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Taylor ’ s apartment and was reportedly already detained by police when the officers arrived at Taylor ’ s residence on the night of March 13th .
At the time of her killing , Breonna Taylor had been working as an emergency medical technician treating COVID-19 patients .
Your final words ?
BENJAMIN CRUMP : Yes .
I agree with Senator Rand Paul that these dangerous no-knock warrants , I believe , are unconstitutional .
But , as Senator Rand said , they should be abolished , because it is foreseeable that innocent @ @ @ @ @ @ @ killed .
And Breonna Taylor is exhibit number one .
And we can not forget about Black women .
As I have been proclaiming , if you ran with Maud in the Ahmaud Arbery case , then you need to stand for Bre , because Breonna Taylor ’ s life mattered .
Black women ’ s lives matter , too .
And this was just an execution of her in the sanctity of her own home .
And I look forward to coming back to talk with you more about developments in that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the aftermath of this execution of this innocent Black woman .
And we have to continue to demand that those police officers are arrested for the killing of this young lady , who her co-workers and family and everybody who knew her says she was just an angel of a person .
AMY GOODMAN : Well , Benjamin Crump , we look forward to having you back .
Ben Crump is a civil rights attorney representing the family of Ahmaud Arbery .
He ’ s the author of Open Season : Legalized @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , we go to India , which is starting to loosen its nationwide lockdown , the largest in world history .
It just saw its biggest spike in coronavirus infections in a day with 6,000 new reported cases .
Stay with us .
AMY GOODMAN : “ The Long March of the Locked-Down Migrants , ” a song by composer , lyric writer and singer Aadesh Ravi for the People ’ s Archive of Rural India .

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: Ben Crump, I wanted to end with another case. You’re also representing the family of Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old aspiring nurse, who was shot to death by police inside her own apartment. Her family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the Louisville Metro Police Department, the lawsuit detailing how police shot Taylor at least eight times after they burst into her apartment, unannounced, with a search warrant. The man police were looking for did not live in Taylor’s apartment and was reportedly already detained by police when the officers arrived at Taylor’s residence on the night of March 13th. At the time of her killing, Breonna Taylor had been working as an emergency medical technician treating COVID-19 patients. Your final words?
BENJAMIN CRUMP: Yes. I agree with Senator Rand Paul that these dangerous no-knock warrants, I believe, are unconstitutional. But, as Senator Rand said, they should be abolished, because it is foreseeable that innocent, law-abiding citizens will be hurt or killed. And Breonna Taylor is exhibit number one.
And we cannot forget about Black women. As I have been proclaiming, if you ran with Maud in the Ahmaud Arbery case, then you need to stand for Bre, because Breonna Taylor’s life mattered. Black women’s lives matter, too. And this was just an execution of her in the sanctity of her own home.
And I look forward to coming back to talk with you more about developments in that case. The police chief resigned yesterday in the aftermath of this execution of this innocent Black woman. And we have to continue to demand that those police officers are arrested for the killing of this young lady, who her co-workers and family and everybody who knew her says she was just an angel of a person.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, Benjamin Crump, we look forward to having you back. Ben Crump is a civil rights attorney representing the family of Ahmaud Arbery. He’s the author of Open Season: Legalized Genocide of Colored People.
Up next, we go to India, which is starting to loosen its nationwide lockdown, the largest in world history. It just saw its biggest spike in coronavirus infections in a day with 6,000 new reported cases. Stay with us.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN: “The Long March of the Locked-Down Migrants,” a song by composer, lyric writer and singer Aadesh Ravi for the People’s Archive of Rural India.