MUMBAI: India’s new coronavirus infections hit a record on Wednesday, as crowds of pilgrims gathered for a religious festival despite oxygen shortages and strict curbs in other areas.
The country reported 184,372 cases in the last 24 hours, health ministry data showed, taking total infections to 13.9 million. Deaths rose by 1,027 to a toll of 172,085. Despite the worsening condition, hundreds of thousands of devout Hindus gathered to bathe in the Ganges River, the third key day of the weeks-long Kumbh Mela.
Sanjay Gunjyal, the inspector general of police at the festival, said around 650,000 people had bathed on Wednesday morning. “People are being fined for not following social distancing in non-crowded ghats (bathing areas), but it is very hard to fine people in the main ghats, which are very crowded,” he said.
More than a thousand cases have been reported in Haridwar district in the last two days, according to government data.
From reporting less than 10,000 cases per day earlier this year, India has been the world’s worst-hit country since April 2 by new daily cases, with the government blaming here a widespread failure to heed curbs on movement and social interaction.
The state of Maharashtra, the epicentre of the national second wave and which accounts for about a quarter of the country’s cases, is due to impose stringent restrictions from Wednesday to contain the spread.
Elsewhere, overstretched private hospitals are turning patients away, placing an increasing burden on government facilities.
In the western state of Gujurat, local media showed a long queue of ambulances waiting outside Ahmedabad Civil Hospital, with some patients being treated there while they waited. There were reports that many private hospitals were short of oxygen and were sending their patients to the public hospital.
