Accounts from Mumbai's Dharavi on efforts to chase away the virus

As efforts to 'chase the virus' begin to pay off in Mumbai's Dharavi, frontline workers and residents share accounts of recent months

By all accounts, physical distancing is impossible in Dharavi, which, at 2.5 sq km, is one of Asia’s largest informal settlements. The first reports of Covid-19 from Dharavi’s snaking lanes — which house more than 850,000 people in crowded tenements as small as 100 sq ft — conjured up a potential tinderbox. In about two months, that threat has seemingly diminished through the inspired efforts of civic administration, volunteers and residents. From the high 90s in early May, the number of positive cases reported daily has dropped to the low-20s and even 10s in June. The mortality rate and the