India’s increasing COVID-19 caseload yesterday made the Asian giant the pandemic’s second-worst-hit country behind the US as its efforts to head off economic disaster gain urgency.
The 90,802 cases added in the past 24 hours pushed India’s total past Brazil with 4.2 million cases.
India is only behind the US, where more than 6.2 million people have been infected, according to Johns Hopkins University.
Photo: AFP
The Indian Ministry of Health also reported 1,016 deaths for a total of 71,642, the third-highest national toll.
The world’s second-most populous country with 1.4 billion people, India has been recording the world’s largest daily increases in COVID-19 cases for almost a month.
Despite more than 2 million new cases in the past month and the novel coronavirus spreading through the country’s smaller towns and villages, the Indian government has continued relaxing restrictions to try and resuscitate the economy.
Yesterday, the Delhi Metro — a rapid transit system that serves India’s sprawling capital, New Delhi, and adjoining areas — resumed operations after five months.
Only asymptomatic people were allowed to board the trains, with masks, social distancing and temperature checks mandatory.
“We are on our way. It’s been 169 days since we’ve seen you!” the official Twitter account of Delhi Metro tweeted.
The capital’s metro train network is India’s largest rapid transport system.
Before closing down in March, the packed trains carried an average of 2.6 million passengers daily.
The reopening comes after India’s economy shrank faster than any other major nation’s, nearly 24 percent last quarter.
India’s economic pain dates to the demonetization of the nation’s currency in 2016 and a hasty rollout of a goods and services tax the next year.
However, the harsh virus lockdown that started on March 24 further exacerbated the country’s economic woes.
When Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi ordered 1.4 billion Indians to stay indoors, the whole economy shut down within four hours.
Millions of people lost their jobs instantly and tens of thousands of migrant workers, out of money and fearing starvation, poured out of cities and headed back to villages.
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