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On January 30, 2020, India reported the first case of COVID-19 in Kerala. The index case was identified as a student returning from Wuhan. As of February 3, 2020, a total of three cases were confirmed in Kerala. However, after a month the number of cases in the country increased dramatically. On March 14, 2020, India reported its first two COVID-19-related deaths. India’s case fatality ratio remained constant at 3.2 percent until June 9, 2020, when it dropped to 2.8 percent. On March 11, 2020, when WHO declared COVID-19 as a pandemic, Indian authorities banned visas and non-essential travel from affected countries. Subsequently, all international passengers returning to India were required to go through a screening test.On March 25, 2020, the Government of India imposed a sudden complete national lockdown for 21 days. After imposition of the lockdown, the government released several guidelines on protection measures such as making wearing face masks compulsory in public places, social distancing, and avoiding mass gatherings.As on February 5, 2020, India had a testing capacity of only 11 laboratories for testing for COVID-19. But by June 12, 2020, it had ramped up its capacity to 885 laboratories that conducted more than 125 tests a day. However, India conducts remarkably fewer tests as compared to other countries.After detecting the first case of COVID-19 on January 30, 2020, India experienced a delayed growth in its test count. Subsequently, however, India recorded a constantly increasing daily incidence rate. By December 30, 2020, the number of cases in India was recorded at 10.2 million. The authors provide a preview of all the chapters in the book.

The authors draw learnings from Asia by examining the strategies employed by governments in countries that have successfully contained the pandemic. They study the policies and strategies implemented in Taiwan, South Korea, Vietnam, Singapore, East Timor, and Mongolia, countries that successfully countered the ravages of COVID-19.The experience of these countries demonstrates the importance of strong leadership in mitigating the pandemic by harnessing the power of rapid response, evidence-based approaches, transparent communication, and partnerships in building a sustainable and successful pandemic response. The leaders of these countries acted decisively in the COVID-19 response with a whole of government approach. The presence of robust public health systems along with national institutions that can act swiftly to prevent the spread of infection was an essential prerequisite for containing the pandemic. The process of enforcing top-down programs was shifted to a multi-stakeholder, participatory approach. Strong and compassionate leadership was undoubtedly the defining trait of nations to navigate time-sensitive issues in today’s pandemic era. Their experiences showed that policies that addressed equity issues and were compatible with the cultural context had a more enduring impact. In countries, where large numbers of infections are still being reported, it is time that leaders acknowledge the importance of acting rapidly on the best available evidence, with transparency and responsibility that is particularly critical in low-income, fragile settings.

UNAIDS defines sex work as selling sexual services (Ditmore in Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS. UNAIDS, 2008, [1]). Sex workers involved in sexual relations with multiple partners are a key group of women who need access to comprehensive sexual health services, including HIV prevention, treatment, and care (Lafort et al. in Reproductive health services for populations at high risk of HIV: performance of a night clinic in Tete province, Mozambique. BMC Health Services Research, 2010, [2]). There are a broad range of sex workers in various locations including those who are street-based and brothel-based, those who work as escorts, and those who work from their own homes.

The role and importance of self-care in the continuum of health care are becoming important subjects of debate among social scientists and health professionals. Interest in the self-care component of health services is stimulated by the convergence of diverse pressures common to health services systems. Depersonalized medical care, rising costs of high technology, focus on curative care, growth of lay knowledge, recognition of the limits of medical care, and documentation of the impact of the individual’s health behavior on patterns of morbidity are all factors stimulating new thinking regarding the importance of individuals and families to the effective and efficient functioning of health service systems.

Transgenders are individuals whose gender identity does not conform to gender norms and expectations traditionally associated with their sex assigned at birth. It is an identity or expression when gender differs from sex. Those who have medical interventions to transition from one sex to another identify as transsexuals.

Truck drivers are a group of recognized marginalized people who are sexually active during their long driving hours. Their exhausting working environment causing lethargy and mental fatigue stirs them to have sex (Essuon et al. in J Health Care Poor Underserved 20:40–52, 2009, [1]). Long-distance truck drivers transport goods over hundreds and even thousands of miles. They may drive flatbed rigs, which are used for carrying steel, or tankers and tractor trailers. They usually drive at night when traffic is light (American Trucking Associations in Long-haul truck driver: definition and nature of work. American Trucking Associations, Encyclopedia, 2020, [2]). Truck drivers and interstate migrants are important bridge populations for the transmission of HIV infection (Pandey et al. in AIDS 22(5):81–90, 2008, [3]).

Men who have sex with men (MSM) are men who engage in sexual activity with members of the same sex, regardless of how they identify themselves. In India, same-sex behavior and relations tend to be much more fluid. These men may identify as gay, homosexual, bisexual, heterosexual, or may dispense with sexual identity altogether.

Set from the perspective of planetary health, the objective of this chapter is to examine the trends set in motion by Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), attempting to discuss the long-term environmental and humanitarian implications. The emergence of zoonotic diseases has underscored that risk-based interventions need to be designed from the perspective of planetary health. The pandemic response must account for its implications on humans and the planet. To address this subject, the chapter discusses emerging infectious diseases in the context of declining planetary health and the COVID-19 pandemic. The chapter underscores the inadequacy of the transient improvement in some environmental quality parameters and short-term decrease in global greenhouse gas emissions. The inevitable global waste crisis arising from increasing use of plastic and other nonbiodegradable materials in the context of COVID-19 is discussed. Inequalities and vulnerabilities, in light of emerging humanitarian concerns, on account of the COVID-19 pandemic are examined. The need for a long-term vision and recommendations that could potentially address the key concerns flagged in the chapter are then discussed. This chapter argues that planetary health approaches that are needed to address the multiscale issues related to environmental quality and human well-being by protecting our planet.

A safe and sustainable waste management system for self care products requires education and multisectoral approaches say Ash Pachauri and colleagues

The vast volume of complex, multidimensional data generated by the Bill a Melinda Gates Foundation's Ananya program to improve maternal, child, and integrated health in Bihar, India, compelled the program to develop a strong visual analytics system. This was necessary to synthesize information and enable Ananya's managers to visualize and interpret data to make effective and informed decisions. The visual analytics system embraces three applications -- a GIS, a data visualization tool, and a program dashboard -- that collectively depict program indicators, providing managers with current assessments of program progress and performance. While distinct in their roles and objectives, the applications are complementary in nature. The applications are in various stages of prototype development and upon deployment will become connected to the system through Ananya's GIS application. This is a unique strategy for the sustainability of the system. In addition to its novel sustainability plans, the system offers a one-of-its-kind application of geo-information technology to improve maternal and child health in Bihar and unique visualizations of program data to support decision making.