Extract from ABC News
India has ordered its armed forces help tackle surging new coronavirus infections, as nations including Britain, Germany and the United States pledged urgent medical aid to try to contain an emergency overwhelming the country's hospitals.
Key points:
New Delhi will receive its first batch of medical oxygen via the Oxygen Express trains
Only a tenth of the Indian population has received a first dose of the vaccine so far
India's official tally is 17.3 million infections and 195,123 deaths, though experts say those numbers are likely underreported
India on Monday set a record for new coronavirus infections for the fifth day in a row, at more than 350,000.
The situation in the world's second most populous country is "beyond heartbreaking", World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said, adding that WHO is sending extra staff and supplies including oxygen concentrator devices.
Oxygen is running out, intensive care units are operating at full capacity and nearly all ventilators are in use.
As the death toll mounts, the night skies in some Indian cities glow from the funeral pyres, as crematories are overwhelmed and bodies are burned in the open air.
"If you've never been to a cremation, the smell of death never leaves you," Vipin Narang, a political science professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the United States, said on Twitter.
On Monday, the country reported 2,812 more deaths, with roughly 117 Indians succumbing to the disease every hour.
Experts say even those figures are probably lower than the actual numbers of deaths.
The new infections brought India's total to more than 17.3 million, behind only the United States.
Other countries pledge assistance
Prime
Minister Narendra Modi said he had spoken to US President Joe Biden
about the crisis, discussing supply chains for COVID-19 vaccine raw
materials and medicines.
Mr Biden said his country would send medical supplies to India to help fight the pandemic.
Australia's federal government said yesterday it was considering rushing ventilators stockpiled at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic to India.
"India is literally gasping for oxygen," federal Health Minister Greg Hunt said.
"And
while we can assist with the national medical stockpile, their
particular request is for assistance with regards to the physical supply
of oxygen."
France will supply India with "substantial medical aid", with shipments from next weekend to include oxygen generators, respirators and cryogenic containers.
Russia said India would receive its first batch of the Sputnik V vaccine on May 1, with 1 million packs of the remdesivir antiviral drug to arrive at the end of May.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has urged all citizens to get vaccinated and to exercise caution amid what he called a "storm" of infections", while hospitals and doctors in some northern states posted urgent notices saying they were unable to cope with the influx.
About 118 million Indians have received at least one dose of the vaccine, which is only about a tenth of the 1.35 billion population.
India was initially seen as a success story in weathering the pandemic, but the virus is now racing through the population, and systems are beginning to collapse.
In January, Mr Modi declared victory over coronavirus, telling a virtual gathering of the World Economic Forum that India’s success couldn’t be compared with anywhere else.
A little less than a month later, his Bharatiya Janata Party passed a resolution hailing Mr Modi as a "visionary leader" who had already "defeated" the virus.
Mr Modi's government has since turned to censoring critics of its handling of the pandemic.
Indian Railways sends oxygen trains
Trains carrying medical oxygen have been sent to overburdened Indian states as a massive second wave of COVID-19 infections has left crowded hospitals across the country without supplies.
"Air, Rail, Road & Sea; Heaven & earth are being moved to overcome challenges thrown up by this wave of COVID19," Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said on Twitter.
Over the last week,
several Indian states have reported running out of medical oxygen, as
Indian social media became overrun with citizens' pleas for critical
medical supplies.
Trains carrying oxygen tanks from Hapa town in the state of Gujarat arrived in the Kalamboli area of Maharashtra on Sunday, travelling a distance of 860 kilometres to bring 45 metric tonnes of oxygen to the worst-affected state in the country.
Indian Railways said oxygen supplies were transported by train from Mumbai to various locations across the country — carrying a total of nearly 150 tonnes of liquid oxygen.
Indian media reports said the first Oxygen Express bound for New Delhi, where the health system is collapsing under the strain of numbers, was slated to arrive on Monday night (local time), carrying 70 tonnes of liquid medical oxygen from a steel plant.
ABC/wires
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