Implications of Stigmatisation in India during the COVID-19 Pandemic

The world witnessed one of the major pandemic events in 1918, wherein approximately 50 to 100 million lives, or about 5 per cent of the global population, were lost due to the H1N1 (influenza) virus (Oxford 2000). About half a billion people were infected with the virus. The worldwide COVID-19 pandemic compares in its intensity with that affliction. From the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in late 2019, India has been among the worst hit countries (Rai et al.. 2020; Chaudhary et al.. 2020; Joshi et al.. 2021).