COVID-19 cases in India yesterday passed 1 million, official data showed, as authorities struggled to check the spread of the pandemic across the world’s second-most populous nation.
With more than 600 people dying daily, lockdowns are being reimposed across the nation of 1.3 billion following an easing of restrictions on hopes the pandemic was under control.
Indian Ministry of Health and Family Welfare data released yesterday put the total number of cases recorded at 1,003,382, a jump of almost 35,000, with 25,602 deaths after an increase of 687 — both new daily records.
Photo: AFP
India, home to some of the planet’s most densely packed cities, is the third nation to hit 1 million cases after the US and Brazil, although the numbers of deaths in those two nations are far higher.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies on Thursday said that India, Pakistan and Bangladesh are together fast becoming the next epicenter of the coronavirus.
“While the world’s attention has been focused on the unfolding crisis in the United States and South America, a concurrent human tragedy is fast emerging in South Asia,” the federation said. “COVID-19 is spreading at an alarming rate in South Asia, home to a quarter of humanity.”
Until now India’s main hotspots have been the cities of Mumbai and New Delhi, but smaller cities and rural areas — where 70 percent of Indians live — have begun to raise the alarm.
Goa on Thursday became the latest state to go under lockdown, imposing a three-day shutdown and a nighttime curfew until Aug. 10.
Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant said that too many people were “stepping out to meet people at parties,” and there was a low level of “awareness and sensitivity.”
The coastal tourist region followed Bihar, one of India’s most impoverished states and home to 125 million, in reintroducing curbs after technology hub Bengaluru did so earlier this week.
Other areas that have also brought back restrictions include parts of badly-hit Tamil Nadu and Kerala — previously lauded as a success story — as well as Assam.
However, the situation on the ground in Bihar underscored the challenges in keeping the pandemic in check.
The streets of state capital Patna were still teeming with traffic and people after the lockdown began, many ignoring social distancing measures and not wearing masks.
“The lockdown is not being fully enforced,” local businessman Ranjeet Singh said.
With per capita spending on healthcare among the lowest in the world, India’s hospitals are reeling.
Front-line health workers, especially in rundown state-run hospitals, are working punishingly long shifts with often shoddy personal protective equipment.
“COVID patients often get delirious. They refuse to eat, pull away their tubes and even get violent with us,” said Showkat Nazir Wani, a doctor at a hospital in Uttar Pradesh state.
Many experts say India is not testing enough people or properly recording fatalities, meaning the true caseload is likely much higher.
The tally is “almost certainly underestimated,” said Gautam Menon, a professor of physics and biology at India’s Ashoka University. “We feel it might be underestimated by a factor of maybe something like 20 to 30 ... and maybe that number could be even larger. We have no idea at the moment.”
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