‘Situation is out of control’ as cases spike and hospitals run short of beds and oxygen
Doctors in Nepal have warned that the country is facing a similar devastating wave of Covid-19 as neighbouring India, with border districts already reporting an alarming spike in cases and shortage of hospital beds and oxygen.
In the Banke district of Nepal, bordering India, doctors at Bheri hospital said it was turning into a “mini India”, with coronavirus spreading out of control.
Continue reading...As bodies pile up at the Ghazipur crematorium, staff and relatives turn their ire on the Modi government
The bodies came, one after another, after another, after another. So many bodies that the ambulances and trucks carrying them into the crematorium blocked traffic.
In Delhi, a city where someone dies from Covid-19 every four minutes, every day is a battle not just for hospital beds but for a space to say goodbye to the dead with dignity.
Continue reading...Huge surge in cases followed erroneous ‘supermodelling’ study suggesting herd immunity had been achieved
They will be remembered as India’s lost months: the stretch between September and February when Covid-19 cases in the country defied global trends, falling sharply throughout the coldest months of the year until they reached four-figure daily totals.
It was inexplicable. Was it the Indian climate? A protection conferred by childhood immunisations? Some speculated India may have naturally reached herd immunity. It was a tantalising idea that took hold in India’s highest circles of policymaking, media and science – even a government-commissioned study suggested herd immunity may indeed have been achieved. It would prove one of the most fatal miscalculations of the Covid-19 pandemic so far.
Continue reading...Analysis: some in China see India’s crisis as a diplomatic opportunity but tensions from last summer remain high
As coronavirus rages across India, its neighbour China has made repeated offers of help. Some are asking whether this could be an occasion to ease the tense relations between the world’s two most populous countries following last year’s border skirmishes.
China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, said this week that Beijing was “ready to provide support and assistance to the Indian people at any time according to the needs of India”. A spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in Delhi said it would “encourage and instruct Chinese companies to actively cooperate”.
Continue reading...Three months after the coup, four brothers tell how they joined protesters fighting the junta before fleeing for the border
The young men only had a moment to study the river before rushing into the waist-deep water. The brothers – ranging in age from 15 to 21 – were unfamiliar with the border area and afraid of being seen. On the run from Myanmar’s military, they pushed on into the Thaunggin River.
After just a few minutes of wading, they stumbled into no man’s land. Moments after crossing the river, three smugglers dressed in military fatigues met them. After handing over 6,000 Thai baht (US$200) and exchanging a few words, the smugglers led them deeper into the woods and then to safety in Thailand.
Continue reading...As India’s hospitals struggle to keep pace with demand, the pandemic has exposed global market failures, lack of knowledge and anticipation
New waves of the Covid-19 pandemic in countries, such as India and Kenya have exposed the poor management of oxygen supplies. Prof Trevor Duke, editor of the World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines on oxygen therapy for children, answered questions on what countries with limited resources can do to secure better supplies.
Continue reading...Huge sandstorms swept across areas of Alxa Right Banner in China’s Inner Mongolia autonomous region on Sunday. The sand clouds enveloped buildings in many cities, turning the sky an apocalyptic yellow. The local authorities issued a yellow alert for poor air quality, noting that the conditions could persist
Continue reading...Foreign Office says Britain ‘first out of the blocks’ with help but Labour calls it a drop in the ocean
The UK has been “the first out of the blocks” with help for India, but will not send vaccines to the Covid-ravaged country until Britain has surplus supplies, the Foreign Office minister Nigel Adams has told MPs.
He said the UK was responding to the Indian government’s needs, and had been the first country to provide practical support “in the face of heartbreaking scenes that had shocked us all”. He said he had friends of Indian heritage who were “at their wit’s end”, and vowed the UK would be at the forefront in providing aid.
Continue reading...Warning: Some viewers may find this video distressing
Crematoriums in Delhi have been forced to build makeshift funeral pyres on spare patches of land after being inundated by bodies from the surging Covid-19 crisis sweeping India.
Crematoriums across the city have been building new platforms after ambulances carrying bodies and grieving families were forced to wait for hours for a funeral pyre.
The country recorded 300,000 new Covid cases on Tuesday and 2,771 new deaths. However, health experts believe the official toll to be far higher
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For Democrats it has been a hundred days of sweeping legislation, barrier-breaking appointments and daring to dream big. For Republicans, a hundred days in the political wilderness.
The party that just four years ago controlled the White House and both chambers of Congress now finds itself shut out of power and struggling to find its feet. As Joe Biden forges ahead with ambitions to shift the political paradigm, Republicans still have a Donald Trump problem.
Related: Republicans still orbiting Trump dark star fail to derail Biden’s first 100 days
Senate Democrats are pushing Biden to admit more refugees into the US.
Biden’s announcement earlier this month that he would not increase refugee admissions from the record low cap of 15,000 that Donald Trump set before leaving office. After intense pushback from advocates and Democratic lawmakers, Biden said he’d increase the cap by 15 May.
Related: Biden walks back refugee admissions policy after outcry and will lift cap in May
Continue reading...Our Delhi correspondents pay tribute to the Indian journalist and Guardian news assistant, who has died of Covid
Every Guardian south Asia correspondent over the past decade can remember the first time they met Kakoli Bhattacharya. A smart, brilliant and tenacious journalist, Kakoli joined the Guardian in Delhi in 2009 as an assistant, translator and fixer – but the role she would play in the lives of all the correspondents who worked with her far outstripped her official duties.
On Saturday, Kakoli – who was known to her friends and family as Pui, meaning “birdsong” – died in hospital of Covid-19. She was 51. Her death leaves a great absence. Here, Delhi correspondents past and present share their lasting memories of a much valued colleague and friend.
Continue reading...Groups that have been fighting military for decades have voiced support for anti-coup protesters
A prominent ethnic armed group in Myanmar says it has captured a military base near the Thai border, as clashes escalated days after the junta chief committed to immediately end violence in the country.
The junta has launched brutal crackdowns against civilians in an attempt to suppress the opposition it faces from the public. Some of Myanmar’s ethnic armed groups, which have spent decades fighting the military for greater autonomy, have voiced support for anti-coup protesters.
Continue reading...Fatima Khalil school has given some children the first taste of education – and love – in their lives
Laughter and excited chatter burst out of the colourfully painted classrooms. In a quiet garden schoolhouse amid the jam-packed Afghan capital, Kabul, pupils run around, study and play in the country’s first official school for children with disabilities.
It’s a far cry from what most of these children have previously experienced. For many, it’s the first time in their lives they feel loved and accepted.
Continue reading...Health body says mass gatherings, low vaccination rates and more contagious variants all to blame for surge in cases
The World Health Organization (WHO) has said India’s deadly Covid-19 second wave was caused by a “perfect storm” of mass gatherings, low vaccination rates and more contagious variants.
Speaking on Tuesday, WHO spokesperson Tarik Jašarević warned against blaming mutations of the virus as the sole cause of the tsunami of cases that have engulfed India in recent weeks, pushing the country’s healthcare system to the brink of collapse, and said that complacent behaviour had also played a role.
Continue reading...From Quito to Kathmandu, millions will be endangered by cuts affecting planning for floods, earthquakes and fires, experts say
UK aid cuts to a programme working to reduce the disaster risk to poor communities around the world could endanger millions of lives and slam shut a brief window of opportunity to build safer cities for centuries to come, experts have warned.
Professor John McCloskey, from Edinburgh University, said the 70% cut to this year’s budget for the Tomorrow’s Cities project was an act of “vandalism” that had wrecked the past two years of collaboration with scientists, NGOs, authorities and communities in Ecuador’s capital Quito, Nairobi, Kathmandu and Istanbul.
Continue reading...‘Brilliant and indispensable’ Bhattacharya worked with every south Asia correspondent since 2009
Kakoli Bhattacharya, an Indian journalist who was a researcher, translator, news assistant and friend to Guardian correspondents for more than a decade, has died from Covid-19 in Delhi.
She died on 23 April after being admitted to hospital earlier in the week during a catastrophic second wave of the virus in India that has claimed tens of thousands of lives since it took off in March.
Continue reading...Government’s plans to ramp up the vaccination programme by the weekend under threat
India is reportedly running out of Covid-19 vaccines just as a virulent second wave continues to devastate the country, threatening the government’s plans to ramp up the vaccination programme by the weekend in an effort to curb the spread of the virus.
From Saturday, everyone in India over the age of 18 will be eligible for a vaccine, a decision made by the government as the virus has brought India’s healthcare system to its knees, with more than new 352,000 cases on Monday and over 2,800 more deaths.
Continue reading...Analysis: experts believe a number of things coalesced to cause the world’s worst coronavirus outbreak
India is now identifying more than 1 million coronavirus cases every three days, with many times more thought to be going unregistered in a vast country where public health surveillance is often poor. Daily deaths exceeded 2,800 on Sunday, but these too are thought to be many times higher.
Epidemiologists and other experts are speculating that several factors have coalesced over the past months to bring India to the point of the world’s worst Covid-19 outbreak.
Continue reading...The mobile library services are an education lifeline for students in Balochistan, where schools have closed during the pandemic
Sharatoon had wanted to continue her studies, but she had to leave school and her beloved books when she got married aged 15.
Now 27, Sharatoon is happy reading again, as every Friday a camel visits her small town, his saddle panniers full of books.
Continue reading...Analysis: Urgent supplies are needed to stem the rampant spread of infections in country of 1.4bn
The catastrophe unfolding in India appears to be the worst-case scenario that many feared from the Covid-19 pandemic: unable to find sufficient hospital beds, access to tests, medicines or oxygen, the country of 1.4 billion is sinking beneath the weight of infections.
The two opposed assumptions of the global response to coronavirus – wealthy countries in the west prioritising vaccines for their own need in one camp, and the argument led by the World Health Organization for global vaccine equality in the other – are also failing to hold as the scale of the crisis in India points to an urgent need to prioritise the response there.
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