India on Wednesday posted a record rise in deaths from COVID-19 over the last 24 hours, pushing its total fatalities past the 250,000 marks.
Deaths from COVID-19 swelled by 4,205, while daily coronavirus cases rose by 348,421, with India’s overall caseload now surging past 23 million, according to health ministry data.
The health experts in the country however argue that the official numbers grossly underestimate the real scale of the pandemic’s impact, and actual deaths and infections could be five to ten times higher.
Meanwhile, Indian’s top virologist Shahid Jameel has noted that India’s Covid 19 infection curve may be showing early signs of flattening, but the decline in the number of the new infections is likely to be slow..
“It is still too early to say whether we have reached the peak. There are some indications of the cases plateauing. But we must not forget that this is a very high plateau,” warned Jameel
India with a population of 1.4 billion people, currently accounts for one in three of the reported death from coronavirus around the world, according to a Reuters tally overwhelming hospital and medical staff, as well as mortuaries and crematoriums.
The worst third-wave hard-hit Indian has seen a short supply of drugs and medical oxygen.
The development has seen the faster spread from cities to small towns and the countryside, ripping through a fragile health system ill-equipped for a crisis of this scale.
Rural parts of the country are also running short of firewood for traditional Hindu cremation and scores of bodies are washing on the banks of the Ganges Rivers which flow through the most populous areas of the northern plains.
The state in India pertaining to the pandemic has increased calls for nationwide lockdown and prompted more and more states to impose tougher restrictions that have hurt businesses and the wider economy.
Meanwhile, a report published by the World Health Organization (WHO) today April 12, has revealed that the B.1.617 variant first identified in India has been detected in at least 44 countries so far.
The global health body has classified it as a “variant of concern” that requires heightened tracking and analysis.
