IMPACT OF COVID 19 ON ENVIRONMENT

Introduction:
The outbreak of coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) first emerged at the
end of December 2019, from the Hunan seafood market in Wuhan City of
China, and declared as an international public health emergency in a
couple of weeks by the World Health Organization. It is an infectious
disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2
(SARS-CoV-2). Genomic analysis revealed that SARS-CoV-2 is
phylogenetically associated with SARS viruses, and bats could be the
possible primary source. Although the intermediate source of origin and
transfer to humans is not clearly known, the rapid human to human
transmission capability of this virus has been established. The transmission
of the virus mainly occurred through person-to-person via direct contact or
droplets produced by coughing, sneezing and talking. As of September 06,
2020; the virus has claimed to spread 216 countries, areas or territories
with the death of 876, 616 humans from 26,763,217 confirmed cases, and
the number is increasing rapidly. The geographic distribution of COVID-19
cases, and the epidemic curve indicating the number of confirmed cases
and deaths in different parts of the world. Usually, the symptoms of COVID-
19 infection include fever, chills, cough, sore throat, breathing difficulty,
myalgia or fatigue, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhoea. Severe cases can lead
to cardiac injury, respiratory failure, acute respiratory distress syndrome,
and even death. Older people along with other underlying medical
conditions are at a high risk of mortality. Till date, there has not been any
significant breakthrough in the development of an effective medicine or a
vaccine for this disease. National and international authorities and experts
suggest the use of non-pharmaceutical measures like wearing face masks
and hand gloves, washing hands with soap, frequent use of antiseptic
solution and maintaining social. To control the spread of the virus and
reduce the death rate, government of most of the affected countries
initiated to restrict the movement of people.  illustrates global examples of
the country wise number of people placed on enforced lockdown due to the
coronavirus pandemic. It is found that India restricted the movement of the
largest number of people (approximately 1.3 billion) as a preventive
measure of COVID-19, which started from March 24, 2020. Except
emergency services (e.g., medical, fire, police, food supply etc.), all other
organizations including educational institutions are being closed to
encourage people to stay at home. All the public transport services (e.g.,
bus, truck, train, aeroplanes etc.) were suspended, with exceptions of the
transportation of essential goods and emergency services. In Italy, the
most extensive travel restrictions are placed after the second World War. In
London, the typically bustling pubs, bars and theatres have been closed,
and people have been advised to stay at home. As of April 7, 2020, World
Economic Forum reported, nearly 3 billion people are faced with some form
of lockdown globally, and movement is being restricted by respective
governments to control the COVID-19 infection. Overall, the pandemic has
caused huge global socio-economic disruption, which directly or indirectly
affected the environment like improvement of air and water quality,
reduction of noise and restoration of ecology. Moreover, the increased use
of personal protective equipment (PPE) (e.g., face mask, hand gloves,
gowns, goggles, face shield etc.), and their haphazard disposal creates
environmental burden. In these circumstances, this study intended to
explore the positive and negative environmental consequences of the
COVID-19 pandemic, and propose possible strategies as future guideline
for environmental sustainability.

Methodology

Study Design
All the guidelines and principles were followed while preparing the
methodology for this research. A thorough literature search was conducted,
and after proper evaluation and analysis, relevant literature was identified and
included for the present review.

To accomplish the desired objectives, all the studies related to the topic
published from Jan 2010 to June 2020 were selected. It was assumed that
including some publications of the previous decade would be helpful in
reflecting upon the practices and strategies that were implemented in
situations previously like the global economic recession A computerized
literature search was performed and journal articles from authentic sources
were extracted, including MEDLINE (PubMed), Google Scholar, Science
Direct, ProQuest, and Emerald Insight. The References in the selected articles
were screened to identify any relevant studies. The literature search was
performed by including the following keywords: “Coronavirus” OR
“pandemic” OR “SARS-CoV-2” OR “COVID-19” OR “sustainability” OR
“quality of life” OR “Global economy” OR “psychology and Organizational
changes and COVID-19.”
Inclusion and Exclusion Criteria
The inclusion criteria were: research articles based on the COVID-19
pandemic and articles, research papers, journals, and news articles published
from 2010 to 2020; articles on sustainability management related to virus
pandemic. The exclusion criteria were: psychology research, articles, and
journals published before 2010; research articles having no link with the
current pandemic’s impact on the psychology of sustainability, quality of life,
and the global economy and additionally, articles that were in languages other
than English. The process of retrieving and screening the studies according to
these criteria in this systematic review is shown in . After an initial search, a
total of 265 articles were identified in MEDLINE (PubMed), and 85 through
other databases. After removing the duplicate records, 272 titles and abstracts
were screened. Finally, only 61 studies were found to be relevant and meet the
inclusion criteria.
Objective & Scope
Even after the interim relaxation targeted to revive economy and survival of
the downtrodden, it is estimated to take at least 3-6 months to bring life to
normal &probably an year to recover economic slowdown so affected by
this pandemic. Many say that this is natures balancing act is being
witnessed by the world due to over exploitation of resources & crossing
carrying capacity due to excessive anthropogenic activities. In many
places, the halt of movement and industry has shown a glimpse of a
cleaner world, with many reports of exceptional blue skies. However, visual
perception alone can be deceiving when observing environmental pollution
especially air pollution. Overall the significance & impacts of lockdown are
still not well understood and likely to have significant role on restoration of
environmental quality, Nevertheless it also provides a unique opportunity to
work in this direction to understand the upshot of lockdown measures on
various parameters of environmental quality particularly when there is a
need to implement such alternative control actions. The present study is an
effort in this direction to assess the usefulness of the lockdown as a
strategic investigation for understanding changes in environmental quality
in the State & the probable apportionment of sources. As a whole, the
study is thought to be a useful supplement to the regulatory bodies since it
may shows pollution source contributions towards specific environmental
attribute especially for quantitative aspects like air emissions load, organic
loads in surface water, bio-medical waste due to health pandemic as well
as impacts of migration on MSW & so on.
METHODOLOGY
Enlisting of aspect –impact register along with timeline of events for which
the impact shall be studied and evaluated. For example,  Initiation of
slowdown and restrictions in movement during 10th to 22nd March 
Followed by 23rd to 20th April as first phase of total lockdown  Then
based on relaxations, if any time period between 20th to 3rd May & so on
till 31st of May 2020 Preferably activity wise listing for entire Maharashtra
State underlining the activity related to regulation of the government to
enlist essential activities such as pharmaceuticals in Chemical zone of
MIDC’s, thermal power plants in certain parts of industrial zones, etc.
Similarly, parameters of evaluation were selected from within the most
applicable & expected impactful parameters such as industrial units active
during various phases, water consumption in industries & commercial
applications, electricity use in residential, fuel use in vehicles
OBSERVATION
COVID-19 has changed the way we live and work, as various health and
safety restrictions keep more of us at home more often. The resulting changes
to our behavior are already impacting the environment around us in many
ways, Researchers from several institutions presented their early results in
a virtual press conference on Dec. 7 at the American Geophysical Union's
2020 fall meeting. They found that the environment is quickly changing,
and the timing of those changes seems to indicate that the pandemic may
be a reason. Deforestation rates are changing in some places, air pollution
is diminishing, water quality is improving, and snow is becoming more
reflective in some areas since the pandemic began earlier this year.It is
also observed that large swaths of the Brazilian Amazon rainforest were
cleared from June to September of this year, since the start of the COVID-
19 pandemic. Rapid deforestation also is occurring in the tropics near
Indonesia and the Congo. Yet, in other parts of the Amazon rainforest such
as Colombia and Peru, deforestation appears to have slowed somewhat
since the onset of the pandemic.

Conclusion

 (1)The outbreak of COVID-19 improved China's air quality in the

short term and significantly contributed to global carbon emissions
reduction. From the time dimension, China's energy consumption
dropped sharply during the outbreak of COVID-19, especially the total
coal consumption. And COVID-19 effectively suppressed the GHG
emissions such as CO2. However, the observed data indicate that this
beneficial effect only occurs during quarantine. As some regions in
China lifted the lockdown and enterprises resumed production,
people and goods began to flow on a large scale. Meanwhile,
declining energy consumption is showing an upward trend, and traffic
congestion is gradually returning to the level before quarantine. It can
be deduced from this that when China completely lifts the lockdown
and resumes production, its energy use and GHG emissions are
likely to exceed the level before the outbreak.
 (2)The COVID-19 significantly reduces the concentration of NO2 in
the atmosphere. This reduction initially occurred near Wuhan and
eventually spread to the whole country. From a spatial perspective,
the reduction of environmental pollutants initially appeared in areas
with severe epidemics because they firstly implemented strict
restrictions. Subsequently, more and more regions adopted
quarantine measures and implemented traffic control. As a result, the
air quality throughout the country improved significantly. This
phenomenon seems to imply a close correlation between the
economy and environmental pollution. The reduction in economic
activities and traffic restrictions directly affects the changes in China's
energy consumption, and effectively reduce the generation of
environmental pollution.