The COVID death toll in India continues to rise dramatically for a 12th straight day, with yet another 300,000 cases recorded on Monday. And this crisis also has a devastating impact on India’s politics.
Sad news again today as 368,147 new COVID cases were recorded in India over the past 24 hours, with the death toll rising to 218,959, according to health ministry data. Medical experts have been saying the figures are an undercount, and now the real numbers may be 5 to 10 times higher than the official tally. Despite this, the health ministry offered a glimmer of hope, reporting that positive cases fell on Monday for the first time since the recent outbreak began.
The virus is now rampaging through every nook and cranny of India.
Although officials remained optimistic about the current situation, COVID sufferers’ faces spoke volumes. Medical oxygen supplies continue to be in short supply, and the exceedingly large number of COVID infections in the country has overwhelmed morgues, and people need to work day and night to cremate bodies of COVID victims.
At least 11 states and union territories have been plagued by a ripple effect brought by the recent vaccine shortage and COVID outbreak.
The Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in the U.S., Anthony Fauci, suggested the Indian government should build temporary hospitals and laboratories, adding that India should learn from China, because China’s strategy literally helped curb the outbreak that happened in the first quarter of last year.
Critics and experts say lockdowns and tighter anti-virus measures should be imposed to contain the recent outbreak. Bhramar Mukherjee, an epidemiology with the University of Michigan suggested on Twitter, “In my opinion, only a national stay-at-home order and declaring medical emergency will help to address the current healthcare needs. The number of active cases is accumulating, not just the daily new cases. Even the reported numbers state there are around 3.5 million active cases.”
But be that as it may, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government still refuses to impose a national lockdown due to concerns over the possible economic impact. His administration has long been criticised for not taking bold steps to curb the spread of the virus.
The virus also has an impact on Modi’s position in India’s politics. Modi’s party suffered a resounding election defeat in West Bengal, a key state. His party retained power in northeastern Assam state but lost in two southern states.
Earlier in the month, a vaccine shortage across the country rendered the country’s vaccination programme useless. But now, India reopened vaccination centres across the country, but only with limited vaccine supplies, despite being the world’s biggest producer of vaccines.
In spite of the ongoing effort to inoculate more adult Indians, data shows only 1.5 percent of the country’s population have been fully vaccinated, and that only 10 percent of Indians have received one dose. Experts say a sluggish vaccination rate is to blame for the recent outbreak, in addition to the government ignoring warnings that a more catastrophic outbreak would plague the country’s already fragile health system.
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