A fire in a hospital treating Covid-19 patients in India killed a dozen people on Friday, a fire official said, as the country struggles to cope with the world's biggest surge of daily coronavirus infections since the pandemic began last year.
Relatives and friends offer a prayer during the funeral of a Covid-19 coronavirus victim at a graveyard in New Delhi. Photo: AFP
India recorded the world's highest daily tally of coronavirus cases for a second day in a row, while daily deaths also jumped by a record.
With 332,730 new cases, India's total caseload has now passed 16 million. Deaths rose by 2263 to reach a total of 186,920, according to health ministry data.
Health officials across northern and western India, including the capital, New Delhi, said they were in crisis, with most hospitals full and running out of oxygen.
"Twelve people have died in the fire, according to the information we have right now," a fire official said about the blaze that began in a critical care unit of the Vijay Vallabh hospital in a suburb of the city of Mumbai.
It was the latest accident to hit a facility in India crowded with people infected with the coronavirus.
On Wednesday, 22 Covid-19 patients died at a public hospital in Maharashtra state when their oxygen supply ran out after a leak in the tank.
India recorded 314,835 new infections on Thursday, surpassing a record held by the United States in January when it hit 297,430 new cases. The US tally has since fallen.
Medical oxygen and beds have become scarce with major hospitals putting notices they had no space to take in patients.
A patient waits to be admitted to hospital in Kolkata. Photo: AFP
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.
"SOS - Less than an hour's Oxygen supplies at Max Smart Hospital & Max Hospital Saket. Awaiting promised fresh supplies from INOX since 1am," the company said.
Similar desperate calls from hospitals and ordinary people have been posted on social media for days this week across the country.
'Hard to watch' - US professor
Professor of biostatistics and epidemiology at the University of Michigan Bhramar Mukherjee 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," Mukherjee said.
A family member is consoled after the death of a Covid-19 patient in Kolkata, India. Photo: AFP
Health experts say India became complacent during the winter, when daily cases were about 10,000 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 pulmonologist Zarir F Udwadia, who is also a member of the Maharashtra state government's task force, in the Times of India.
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.
Canada banned flights from India, joining Britain, United Arab Emirates and Singapore in 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.
- Reuters