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 The southern state of Karnataka, home to the tech city of Bengaluru,
ordered a lockdown from Tuesday, joining the western industrial
state of Maharashtra, where lockdowns run until May 1, although some
states were set to lift the measures this week.
But the patchy curbs, complicated by local elections and mass
festival gatherings, could prompt breakouts elsewhere, as infections
rose by 352,991 in the last 24 hours, with crowded hospitals running
out of oxygen supplies and beds.
"Currently the hospital is in beg-and-borrow mode and it is an
extreme crisis situation," said a spokesman for the Sir Ganga Ram
Hospital in the capital, New Delhi.
In the western diamond industry hub of Surat, five COVID-19 patients
died following a hospital blaze on Sunday after rescue workers moved
them to hospitals with few beds in intensive care units, a municipal
official told Reuters.
Earlier, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had urged all citizens to get
vaccinated and exercise caution, while hospitals and doctors put out
urgent notices saying they were unable to cope with the rush of
patients.
In some of the worst-hit cities, such as New Delhi, bodies were
being burnt in makeshift facilities offering mass services.
Television channel NDTV broadcast images of three health workers in
the eastern state of Bihar pulling a body along the ground on its
way to cremation, as stretchers ran short.
"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.
"My heart breaks for all my friends and family in Delhi and India
going through this hell."
On Sunday, President Joe Biden said the United States would send raw
materials for vaccines, medical equipment and protective gear to
India. Germany joined a growing list of countries pledging to send
supplies.
India, with a population of 1.3 billion, has an official tally of
17.31 million infections and 195,123 deaths, after 2,812 deaths
overnight, health ministry data showed, although health experts say
the figures probably run higher.
The scale of the second wave knocked oil prices as traders worried
about a fall in fuel demand in the world's third-biggest oil
importer.
[to top of second column] |
 RALLY BACKLASH
Politicians, especially Modi, have faced criticism for holding
rallies during state election campaigns that draw thousands of
people, packed close together in stadiums and grounds.
Several cities have ordered curfews, while police have been deployed
to enforce social distancing and mask-wearing. The southern state of Karnataka, home to Bengaluru, will impose a
14-day lockdown from Tuesday to rein in a surge of infections, its
chief minister said.
Still, about 8.6 million voters were expected to cast ballots on
Monday in the eastern state of West Bengal, in the final phases of
an election set to wrap up this week.
Also voting in local elections was the most populous state of Uttar
Pradesh, which has been reporting an average of 30,000 infections a
day. Vaccine demand has outpaced
supply as the inoculation campaign widened this
month, while companies struggle to boost output,
partly because of a shortage of raw material and
a fire at a facility making the AstraZeneca
dose.
However, the federal government will not import
vaccines itself but expects states and companies
to do so instead, in a step to back domestic
manufacturers, two government officials told
Reuters. [L4N2MF3ZM]
Hospitals in Modi's western home state of
Gujarat also face an acute shortage of oxygen,
doctors said.
Just seven ICU beds of a total of 1,277 were
available in 166 private hospitals designated to
treat the virus in the state's largest city of
Ahmedabad, data showed.
 "The problem is grim everywhere, especially in
smaller hospitals, which do not have central
oxygen lines," said Mona Desai, former president
of the Ahmedabad Medical Association.
Neighbouring Bangladesh sealed its border with
India for 14 days, its foreign ministry said,
though trade will continue. Air travel has been
suspended since Bangladesh imposed a lockdown on
April 14 to combat record infections and deaths.
(Reporting by Shilpa Jamkhandikar and Neha Arora;
Additional reporting by Sumit Khanna, Krishna
Das, Anuron Kumar Mitra, Chandini Monnappa in
Bengaluru, Rajendra Jadhav in Satara, and Ruma
Paul in Dhaka; Writing by Richard Pullin;
Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
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