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24th April 2021
10:18am BST

India's official death toll currently stands at 190,000 deaths which, if measured per capita in a country of over 1.3 billion, does not place it among the worst countries affected by the virus. However, daily case numbers are now over 300,000, and deaths are approaching 3,000 - with some analysis of the figures from the Financial Times suggests daily case numbers could be in the millions, with daily deaths in excess of 17,000. The Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi, has held crisis talks with the Indian government to discuss a response to the growing humanitarian crisis. "Discussed the COVID-19 situation with Chief Ministers of the states seeing a surge in infections," he said."Covid-19 has hit this country with a ferocity not seen before...but not unexpected either". WARNING - this is a very distressing but necessary report from @yogital, Fred Scott and Sanjay Ganguly on the human catastrophe unfolding in #Delhi. Please watch #CovidIndia #BBCNewsTen pic.twitter.com/A5Pi1nwd0n
— Nicola Careem (@NicolaCareem) April 21, 2021
"We discussed the steps being taken to strengthen the fight against the pandemic." The situation has become so desperate that people have been posting on social media requesting oxygen, recommendations for hospitals that have space, and medical aid. Dr Atul Gogia, a consultant at the Sir Ganga Ram hospital in Delhi, told the BBC: "All our telephone lines are jammed. "People are continuously calling the helpline. "There is a big rush outside the hospital: there are ambulances parked, patients wanting to get deboarded, but the problem is, there is no space. "We try to mobilise, we try to discharge patients who become stable as early as possible so that we can increase the turnaround, but things are difficult right now." Unlike the first wave, people younger and younger are falling ill and dying from the virus.Discussed the COVID-19 situation with Chief Ministers of the states seeing a surge in infections. We discussed the steps being taken to strengthen the fight against the pandemic. https://t.co/vE3UAHXmMr
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) April 23, 2021
As a result of the complacency weddings, celebrations, and religious festivals have gone ahead - as well as over 100 million Indians heading to the polls in regional elections.
And, at present, just 130 million people in India have been vaccinated - less than 10 per cent of its more than 1.3 billion population.
India until recently were manufacturing and distributing doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine abroad, but have since placed restrictions on vaccine exports due to the growing public health crisis.
As a result of the variant, South Africa placed the roll out of the AstraZeneca vaccine on hold, citing data that suggested it was not providing full protection against the variant; this is because the virus can mutate to bypass the body's antibodies, making the vaccine less effective.
However, surge testing for the Indian variant is yet to take place, and the government have not yet officially listed it as "a variant of concern"; surge testing is happening for cases of the South African variant in the UK, however. The government have faced criticism for the delay in adding India to the red list, as other countries with lower case rates have been classed as red list countries while India - despite its spiralling case numbers - had not.India will be added to the UK's travel-ban red list of countries from Friday, says Health Secretary Matt Hancock
"We must protect the progress that we've made in this country"https://t.co/20C6bLDqpB pic.twitter.com/3fyACYc39D — BBC Politics (@BBCPolitics) April 19, 2021
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