Category Archives: India

Delhi hospitals issue SOS alerts over oxygen supplies as India’s Covid crisis mounts

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Staff posted emergency messages on social media as several hospitals in the capital exhausted oxygen supplies on Thursday night

Hospitals in Delhi issued SOS alerts on Friday morning, warning they had just a few hours supply of oxygen left, as another unprecedented surge in Covid-19 cases overwhelmed health systems in major Indian cities.

Hospital staff posted emergency messages on social media throughout Thursday and Friday, saying they were unable to cope with demand and pleading for assistance from government.

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Rape victims in south Asia still face vaginal tests, report finds

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Unscientific ‘morality’ examination linked to low conviction rates and violates women’s rights, says Equality Now

Physical vaginal tests are still used to determine whether women and girls have been raped in India, Nepal and Sri Lanka, according to a new report.

The practice remains widespread in all three countries and some courts refer to the test in judgments, despite it having no scientific basis and being banned in India.

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Coronavirus live: EU asks states to support legal action against AstraZeneca; UK finds 55 more cases of Indian variant

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Some member states raise concerns over wisdom of action, saying it could undermine confidence in vaccine; further cases of B.1.617 found in Britain

Canada’s government, under pressure to suspend flights from India and Brazil over fears about the spread of the coronavirus, could make an announcement on the matter shortly, a senior medical official said on Thursday.

The prime minister Justin Trudeau said earlier this week that officials were studying the example of the UK, which is obliging travellers who have been in India in the past 10 days to spend 10 days in quarantine.

Here is a quick recap of all the main Covid updates from around the world:

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UK south-Asian diaspora despairs as India joins Covid red list

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With travel from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh banned, some UK families are stuck abroad, while others cannot visit frail relatives

For the past 17 months, Saurav Dutt has had to watch from afar as relatives were lost to Covid, ancestral homes were damaged by a typhoon, and the mental toll of isolation, grief and illness led elders to question their very existence.

He had flights booked for May, but with cases soaring and India on the UK’s travel red list from 23 April, that is no longer an option. “It’s a very worrying time,” Dutt said. “You would think there are a million ways to help from over here, but we’re handcuffed. To deal with these things we need to be there.”

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Revealed: big shortfall in Covax Covid vaccine-sharing scheme

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Only a fifth of Oxford/AstraZeneca doses expected by May delivered as export bans, hoarding and supply shortages bite

The global vaccine-sharing initiative Covax has so far delivered about one in five of the Oxford/AstraZeneca doses it estimated would arrive in countries by May, according to a Guardian analysis, starkly illustrating the cost of export bans, hoarding and supply shortages for a scheme that represents a key lifeline for many in the developing world.

The organisations that run Covax had predicted countries would receive fewer vaccines than expected after the Indian government restricted exports from its largest manufacturer in response to a catastrophic second wave there, but the figures reveal the shortfall to be severe, leaving many governments scrambling to secure doses elsewhere.

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Covid-19: India’s response to second wave is warning to other countries

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Analysis: India’s surveillance of the virus missed its real prevalence earlier this year

The blindspots in India’s response to its second, devastating wave of coronavirus infections serve as a stark warning to other countries.

In retrospect it was clear that the figures for new infections that India was reporting in January and February were probably too good to be true, with a country of more than 1.3 billion people seeing its caseload drop from its first peak last year of over 100,000 cases a day to under 10,000.

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India: officials scramble to stop oxygen tank leak that left 22 Covid-19 patients dead – video

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At least 22 patients have died in a western Indian hospital after their oxygen supply was interrupted. The leak was plugged by the fire service within 15 minutes, but there was disruption in the Zakir Hussain Hospital in Nashik, a city in Maharashtra state, that is the worst-hit by the latest surge in coronavirus cases in India. Television showed images of people with empty oxygen cylinders crowding refilling facilities as they scrambled to save stricken relatives in hospital.

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India reels from second Covid wave as families beg for supplies on social media

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Rapid glut of cases stretches supplies of beds in intensive care units, ventilators and oxygen

Hundred of Indians, including Delhi government administrators, have begged for help finding oxygen and other crucial medical supplies on social media as India reels from a devastating second wave of coronavirus, leading to caseloads growing by nearly 300,000 every day.

Faulty oxygen supplies at a western Indian hospital have killed more than 20 Covid-19 patients, adding to the country’s highest-ever daily death toll from the virus.

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India’s shocking surge in Covid cases follows baffling decline

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Analysis: Rapid spread of cases across country comes after long spell in which virus seemed almost to vanish

More than a million new infections in four days, rampant oxygen shortages and the Indian capital, Delhi, awash with sirens: this is what happens when wildly infectious new variants hit a population that was no longer socially distancing, or never could.

Related: ‘The system has collapsed’: India’s descent into Covid hell

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Why is India seeing such a huge surge in Covid-19 cases?

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A ‘double mutant’ strain, lack of medical supplies and the relaxation of lockdowns have combined to foment disaster

India has seen a terrifying increase in coronavirus cases in the past few weeks. Tuesday saw another new record when the country racked up 295,041 new cases, up from around 273,000 from the previous day, with no sign that the surge is abating.

The capital Delhi was placed in lockdown for a week from Monday, and Maharashtra state, the centre of the surge and home to the financial capital, Mumbai, further tightened restrictions on shops and home deliveries from Tuesday.

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Delhi warns hospitals running out of oxygen amid India’s devastating Covid wave

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City government calls for help on social media, saying major hospitals only have enough oxygen to last eight to 24 hours

Indian authorities scrambled to shore up supplies of medical oxygen to hospitals in the capital, Delhi, on Wednesday as a fast-spreading second wave of coronavirus stretched medical infrastructure to breaking point, officials and doctors said.

India, the world’s second most populous country, is reporting the world’s highest number of new daily cases and is approaching a peak of about 297,000 cases in one day that the US hit in January.

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Indian expansion of Covid vaccine drive may further strain supplies

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All adults to be eligible from 1 May, making jab available to at least 400 million more people

India has announced it will soon open its vaccination programme to every adult in response to soaring Covid-19 infections – a measure that could further strain supplies in parts of the world reliant on Indian-made vaccines for their own campaigns.

From 1 May, Indian states will be free to administer doses to anyone aged older than 18, the central government announced on Monday as part of a package of policies to tackle a second wave that has overwhelmed hospitals and led to oxygen shortages across the country.

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Boris Johnson cancels India trip due to Covid situation

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Downing Street says next week’s visit won’t go ahead ‘in light of the current coronavirus situation’

Boris Johnson’s planned visit to India next week has been cancelled because of the country’s escalating coronavirus crisis, a joint statement by the UK and India has announced.

“In the light of the current coronavirus situation, prime minister Boris Johnson will not be able to travel to India next week,” said the statement, released by Downing Street.

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Add India to UK travel ban list to stop Covid variant, urges scientist

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Indian coronavirus variant has potential to ‘scupper’ lockdown easing, says professor of immunology

India should be placed on the UK’s “red list” for travel after the discovery of a new coronavirus variant, according to a leading scientist.

Prof Danny Altmann, from Imperial College London, said it was “mystifying” and “confounding” that those flying in from the country were not required to stay in a hotel.

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Covid variant first detected in India is found in the UK

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Seventy-seven cases of B.1.617, which has potentially worrying mutations, reported in England and Scotland

A coronavirus variant with potentially worrying mutations that was first detected in India has been found in the UK.

In total, 77 cases of the variant, known as B.1.617, have been recorded in the UK up to 14 April, according to the latest update from Public Health England (PHE), released on Thursday. Of these, 73 were recorded in England and four in Scotland.

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Medics’ anger as Delhi orders most beds in private hospitals be reserved for Covid cases

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Doctors say ‘absurd’ move, made as second wave surges, is unfair on non-Covid patients

Doctors have expressed fears for patients after the government ordered that the majority of the beds in 14 of Delhi’s biggest private hospitals be reserved exclusively for Covid patients, as the Indian capital’s healthcare system struggles to cope with a virulent second wave.

The announcement by the government came as the situation in Delhi grew increasingly dire, with over 17,000 new cases reported on Wednesday, breaking all records since the pandemic began, and 104 deaths. The capital has overtaken Mumbai, previously Covid ground zero in India, in terms of the number of new cases reported every day.

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‘A tsunami of cases’: desperation as Covid second wave batters India

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Doctors speak of a new variant of the virus that appears to be spreading faster than ever before

Dr K Senthil had feared it was coming.

He had feared it as he saw the reckless crush of hundreds of people taking part in large wedding parties over the past months, feared it as he saw the maskless faces of shoppers at the market, feared it as he witnessed thousands come together for political rallies in the ongoing elections in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, where he is the president of the state medical council.

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Purple revolution: India’s farmers turn to lavender to beat drought

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Faced with climate change, farmers in Jammu and Kashmir are switching from maize to essential oils

It’s late June and the field is glowing with fragrant purple as the women in their flowing shalwar kameez arrive with scythes to harvest the lavender. In the 30-odd villages on the hilly slopes of Jammu’s Doda district, more than 200 farmers have shifted from maize to lavender production, starting a “purple revolution” in the region.

The village of Lehrote had a moment of agricultural fame this year when a 43-year-old farmer, Bharat Bhushan, won a prestigious award for innovative farming from the Indian Agricultural Research Institute, one of several institutions across the country looking to find ways of coping with the climate crisis and its devastating impact on farming. Lavender, a drought-resistant crop, can be grown on poor soil and likes lots of sun but needs little water.

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Covid pandemic still growing exponentially, WHO says

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World Health Organization says ‘confusion and complacency’ prolonging global situation

The global coronavirus pandemic is still growing exponentially, the World Health Organization said on Monday, as it reported 4.4m cases in the last week, the seventh straight week of rising numbers.

The latest global figures represent a 9% increase in infections on last week and a 5% rise in deaths.

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