Covid has India in its grip
Ground zero of the world’s COVID-19 outbreak has shifted after India recorded more than 100,000 fresh cases for the first time, topping the daily totals everywhere else in the world.
Ground zero of the world’s COVID-19 outbreak has shifted to India as it recorded more than 100,000 fresh cases on Monday for the first time, topping the daily totals everywhere else in the world.
The country is locking down neighbourhoods and restricting travel again even as it tries to ratchet up its vaccination drive to save lives and salvage its nascent economic recovery.
With the number of new infections in the US and Brazil retreating from recent highs, India has the most new cases in the world. The financial centre of Mumbai and the surrounding state of Maharashtra are ground zero again, dashing hopes that India’s megacities may have seen the worst as the most densely populated neighbourhoods reached some sort of herd immunity.
“It’s spreading very fast, much more than the first phase,” said Deepak Baid, a doctor in charge of a COVID-19 unit in a government hospital in Mumbai. “It’s spreading to all the age groups.”
As daily infections tumbled from just under 100,000 in September to fewer than 15,000 in February, Indians started going out more and being less vigilant about the standard COVID-fighting measures such as wearing masks, social distancing and avoiding unnecessary gatherings.
Mobility data from Google showed activity rebounding as people started shopping and going to work again. Movement around retail areas, which had plummeted to around 80% below regular levels in the middle of the nationwide lockdown last spring, rebounded to around 20% below normal levels this year, according to the Google Mobility Reports.
As predictions of a winter surge on the back of cold weather and a string of family holidays didn’t come true late last year, more Indians became optimistic that the worst was behind them. In mid-January when India started its own vaccination drive, citizens gained ever more confidence and became less vigilant.
Family gatherings became more frequent, weddings became bigger and the number of people visiting places of worship increased, creating more opportunity for the virus to spread. Meanwhile, India started a big election season as five states with a total population of more than 200 million people are choosing their local politicians this month. Packed political rallies have become another avenue of infection in the world’s largest democracy.
“The surge happened because of super-spreader events like weddings and social gatherings, cricket matches, festivals and election campaign rallies,” said Giridhara R. Babu, epidemiologist at the Indian Institute of Public Health in Bangalore and an adviser to the government. “The general feeling was that the pandemic was over.”
What all the people rushing to crowded events didn’t know was that more contagious versions of the virus were arriving from abroad and new ones were emerging in India. One, ominously dubbed the double-mutant virus, added an Indian mutation to one that was first recorded in America.
Indian scientists said there hasn’t been enough testing to measure which variants are powering the surge, but the accelerating rate of the spread of infections suggests a more viral form is spreading across the country.
“This is a big cause of worry but what we see is the opposite” of what happened during the outbreak last year, said T. Jacob John, a retired professor of virology at the Christian Medical College in the southern city of Vellore. “There is no fear, no worry, no concern” this year, he said.
India has responded with new lockdowns, though nothing as tight as the national lockdown last year where the whole country was forced to stay at home for close to two months. The western megacity of Mumbai and its state of Maharashtra have been hardest hit and have just shut down malls, eateries, bars and places of worship to force people to stay home.
New Delhi is ramping up the public campaign to convince people to stay vigilant. It has also ratcheted up its vaccination drive, doling out more than two million shots a day, up from fewer than one million a few weeks ago. To attract more people to come forward, it opened up the shots to everyone above the age of 45 this month.
India has administered more than 70 million doses so far but has a long way to go to even reach its initial target of inoculating 300 million people by August. Only the US and China have given out more COVID-19 shots.
India is trying to increase vaccinations in the harder-hit states, and some states are even taking the vaccinations to the people. India’s southern city of Chennai launched a new program where health workers set up vaccination centres and camps at residential neighbourhoods and local markets. Residents just need to show up at the camps with an official identification card to get the shot.
“The idea is to send hospitals to homes to help the elderly and vulnerable group,” said Chennai Corporation Commissioner G. Prakash.
India, which is home to the Serum Institute of India, one of the world’s leading vaccine manufacturers, has seen its domestic vaccination ambitions grow so much that it had to delay some previously planned exports, leaving some countries struggling to find alternatives as they battle their own outbreaks.
The Wall Street Journal
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