India’s fragile healthcare system being tested out of limits as cases rise further
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Raven Ruma
- . May 3, 2021
- . Update: May 3, 2021 8:31 pm
India is battling a fierce second wave of the coronavirus that has taken on its fragile and delicate healthcare system with over 300,000 daily cases reported for the last 13 days.
Hospitals have been subjected to saturation as medical oxygen supplies have deteriorated. The same has been the scenario in crematoriums and morgues that too have been swamped.
The count of deaths from Covid-19 rose by 3,417 in the last 24 hours. The overall caseload is a little shy of 20 million as India’s total infections stand at an astounding count of 19.93 million. The total fatalities are 218,959, as per the health ministry data.
Medical experts are of the opinion that these numbers do not show the grave scenario of COVID-19 in India as the real numbers, in the country of 1.35 billion, maybe five to 10 times higher than the current official tally.
The rise in infections is India’s biggest crisis since the Modi government took over in 2014. Modi has been severely criticized for not taking timely steps to curb the virus spread. His administration, until a few days back, let millions of unmasked people attend religious festivals and dense political rallies.
Read more : COVID goes out of control in India as countries promise rapid aid
It was until a forum of scientific advisers, made up by the government for monitoring the COVID scenario, warned in early March of a new and more dangerous variant of the coronavirus taking hold in the country that the government started taking some steps. It is to be seen how his handling of the crisis might affect the political future of Modi.
Leaders of the opposition parties signed, on Sunday, a letter asking Modi to immediately initiate free national vaccination and to surge oxygen supplies to hospitals and health centres. Several states have halted the widening of the vaccination drive for adults as a lack of vaccines has started to be seen.
