Lockdown 5.0 | Cinemas to reopen in third phase of unlock, date of restart will be decided after assessment

For over two months, the box office business is running dry and theatres have incurred huge losses.

Maryam Farooqui

May 30, 2020 / 08:32 PM IST

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Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) issued new guidelines on May 30 for phased re-opening of areas outside the containment zones. Reopening of cinemas halls, fall in phase III and the decision regarding restarting theatres will be taken after assessing the situation.

Theatres in many states had shut shop as a precautionary measure even before the nationwide lockdown was announced.

For over two months, the box office business is running dry and theatres have incurred huge losses.

According to film trade analysts, this is probably the first time in the history of Indian cinemas when theatres have recorded zero ticket sales for as long as 60 days.

If we go by expert analysis then Hindi film industry alone has recorded losses to the tune of Rs 1,500 crore since the lockdown was imposed in the country.

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Frequently Asked Questions

How does a vaccine work?

A vaccine works by mimicking a natural infection. A vaccine not only induces immune response to protect people from any future COVID-19 infection, but also helps quickly build herd immunity to put an end to the pandemic. Herd immunity occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population becomes immune to a disease, making the spread of disease from person to person unlikely. The good news is that SARS-CoV-2 virus has been fairly stable, which increases the viability of a vaccine.

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There are broadly four types of vaccine — one, a vaccine based on the whole virus (this could be either inactivated, or an attenuated [weakened] virus vaccine); two, a non-replicating viral vector vaccine that uses a benign virus as vector that carries the antigen of SARS-CoV; three, nucleic-acid vaccines that have genetic material like DNA and RNA of antigens like spike protein given to a person, helping human cells decode genetic material and produce the vaccine; and four, protein subunit vaccine wherein the recombinant proteins of SARS-COV-2 along with an adjuvant (booster) is given as a vaccine.

What does it take to develop a vaccine of this kind?

Vaccine development is a long, complex process. Unlike drugs that are given to people with a diseased, vaccines are given to healthy people and also vulnerable sections such as children, pregnant women and the elderly. So rigorous tests are compulsory. History says that the fastest time it took to develop a vaccine is five years, but it usually takes double or sometimes triple that time.

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