WHO says COVID in India has intensified “perfect storm” of conditions Coronavirus pandemic News

The World Health Organization (WHO) has said that the wave of COVID-19 infections in India is the result of mass gatherings, “more contagious variants” and low vaccination rates.

New cases of coronavirus in India remained at more than 300,000 for the sixth day in a row on Tuesday, while its armed forces called for urgent medical assistance to deal with a huge rise in infections beyond hospitals and incinerators.

The WHO is providing critical equipment and supplies to India, including 4,000 oxygen concentrators, which only need one source of energy, WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said.

The death toll in India is rising to around 200,000 and hospitals lacking oxygen supply and beds are pushing away coronavirus patients.

“Nowadays, part of the problem is that a lot of people go to the hospital (even because they don’t have access to information / advice), even though home-based care can be tracked very safely,” Jasarevic said.

Less than 15% of COVID-19 infected people need hospital care and even less will need oxygen, he added.

Community-based centers should examine and classify patients and provide advice on safe home care, but said the information is also available through regular phones or dashboards.

“As is true in any country, the WHO has said that relaxing personal protection measures, combining crowded gatherings and more contagious variants can lead to a perfect storm while vaccination coverage is low,” he said.

The crisis has banned flights from several countries in India, including Canada, Belgium and the United Arab Emirates.

Also on Tuesday in Australia all direct flights of Indian passengers were suspended until May 15, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced.

“Destructive” situation

A doctor in the Indian capital New Delhi has said the situation in Indian hospitals is “absolutely devastating” as fans and ICU beds are fully occupied.

“There are no beds in the wardrobe, our emergency room is full of sick people, they have nowhere to go,” Sumit Ray told Al Jazeera via Skype.

“Our young resident doctors, nurses, are completely traumatized. They are working very hard, but they are emotionally devastated, ”he added.

The Indian government has called on its armed forces to help deal with the situation, with many saying it is the worst health crisis in modern Indian history.

Chief of Defense Staff Bipin Rawat said on Monday that oxygen would be released from the reserves of the armed forces and that retired medical staff would join the fighting health facilities in a large number of cases.

Informing Prime Minister Narendra Modi about the army’s readiness to deal with the crisis, Rawat said the military’s oxygen cylinders will be routed to hospitals that need gas to save their lives.

Many patients have been forced to go to the black market when the prices of life-saving medicines and oxygen cylinders have risen.

Countries are increasing aid

Major health supplies in India began on Tuesday. A British shipment, including 100 fans and 95 oxygen concentrators, arrived in the capital New Delhi, although Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s spokesman said Britain did not have a surplus dose of the COVID-19 vaccine.

France is sending eight large oxygen-generating plants to Ireland, Germany and Australia this week while oxygen concentrators and fans are being dispatched, an Indian Foreign Ministry official said it stressed the crucial need for oxygen.

India’s first “Oxygen Express” train entered New Delhi, loaded with about 70 tonnes of oxygen from an eastern state, but the crisis has not diminished in the city of 20 million people at the epicenter of the world’s deadliest wave of infection.

U.S. senior officials have given India ongoing support to tackle the coronavirus crisis and said the country is still at the “first point” of the crisis.

Kurt Campbell, coordinator of the Indo-Pacific White House National Security Council, said in a brief call for a U.S. response that President Joe Biden called Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi by phone on Monday: “Inform us of what you need and we will do it.”

A COVID-19 patient breathes with the help of an oxygen mask while waiting inside a car rickshaw to enter a COVID-19 government hospital in Ahmedabad, India. [Ajit Solanki/AP]

Biden said in a media appearance on Tuesday that he had spoken at length with Modi about, among other things, when the U.S. could send vaccines to a country of 1.3 billion people and said he had a clear intention to do so.

The president did not give a specific date when vaccine shipments could begin, but White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters on Monday that the U.S. could begin shipping up to 60 million doses of the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine as soon as in the coming weeks.

Meanwhile, Biden said the U.S. will begin sending other supplies and providing support to India, including mechanical parts needed for Gilead Sciences ’virus-based drug remdesivir and vaccine-building machinery.