New Delhi:
India recorded 3,32,730 new COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours, the highest single-day spike since the pandemic broke out last year.
India has crossed the mark of 3 lakh COVID-19 cases for two consecutive days now. This has taken the cumulative count of the COVID infection in the country to 1,62,63,695.
According to the official data issued by the Union Health Ministry, the country has recorded 2,263 new deaths due to COVID-19 in the last 24 hours. As many as 1,86,920 people have succumbed to the viral infection in India so far. There are 24,28,616 active COVID-19 cases in the country now.
As many as 1,36,48,159 recoveries have been reported so far, out of which 1,93,279 were reported in the last 24 hours. According to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), 27,44,45,653 samples have been tested for COVID-19 up to April 22. Of these, 17,40,550 were tested yesterday.
Meanwhile, the total number of vaccine doses administered in the country stands at 13,54,78,420.
Maharashtra on Thursday reported 67,013 new coronavirus cases, slightly less than the day before, taking its case tally to 40,94,840.
As many as 568 patients succumbed to the infection, taking the toll to 62,479, said a health department official.
Delhi reported more than 26,000 new cases and 306 deaths, or about one fatality every five minutes, the fastest since the pandemic began.
Medical oxygen and beds have become scarce, with major hospitals putting up notices saying they have no room for any more patients and police being deployed to secure oxygen supplies. Max Healthcare, which runs a network of hospitals in northern and western India posted an appeal on Twitter on Friday for emergency supplies of oxygen at its facility in Delhi.
"We regret to inform that we are suspending any new patient admissions in all our hospitals in Delhi … till oxygen supplies stabilise," the company said. Similar desperate calls from hospitals and ordinary people have been posted on social media for days this week across the country.
Bhramar Mukherjee, a professor of biostatistics and epidemiology at the University of Michigan in the United States, said it was now as if there was no social safety net for Indians. "Everyone is fighting for their own survival and trying to protect their loved ones. This is hard to watch," he said.
'SELF-ASSURED HUBRIS'
In New Delhi, people losing loved ones are turning to makeshift facilities that are undertaking mass burials and cremations as funeral services get swamped.
Amid the despair, recriminations have begun. Health experts say India got complacent in the winter, when new cases were running at about 10,000 a day and seemed to be under control, and lifted restrictions to allow big gatherings.
"Indians let down their collective guard. Instead of being bombarded with messages exhorting us to be vigilant, we heard self-congratulatory declarations of victory from our leaders, now cruelly exposed as mere self-assured hubris," wrote Zarir F Udwadia, a pulmonologist and a member of the Maharashtra state government's task force, in the Times of India. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government ordered an extensive lockdown last year in the early stages of the pandemic.
But it has been wary of the economic costs and upheaval to the lives of legions of migrant workers and day labourers of a reimposition of sweeping restrictions. A new more infectious variants of the virus, in particular a "double mutant" variant that originated in India, may have helped accelerate the surge, experts said.
Meanwhile,Canada banned flights from India, joining Britain, United Arab Emirates and Singapore blocking arrivals. Britain said it found 55 more cases of the Indian variant, known as B.1.617, in its latest weekly figure, taking the total of confirmed and probable cases of the variant there to 132.
India, a major producer of vaccines, has begun a vaccination campaign but only a tiny fraction of the population has received a shot.
Authorities have announced vaccines will be available to anyone over 18 from May 1, but experts say there will not be enough for the 600 million people who will become eligible.