India

[Baileysforchristmas]

How on earth are India going to get there numbers down? If they impose to harsher lockdown people will starve to death. I think virus was quietly spreading in February when everyone was saying how well India was doing.

www.theguardian.com/world/2021/apr/21/delhi-warns-hospitals-running-out-of-oxygen-amid-indias-devastating-covid-wave

[quote Baileysforchristmas]@paralysedbyinertia we know it will effect everyone but the poor will be effected far more. how are India going to deal with it? lockdown means millions of people could starve to death or lockdown will save the rich from dying from Covid?[/quote]
I'm not necessarily suggesting lockdown is the solution, but letting the virus run wild is not going to help the poor.

Enabling people to work is one thing - though many poorer Indians have been out of work since the start of the pandemic anyway - but allowing mass gatherings for political rallies, religious festivals and huge weddings is crazy.

The poor will not benefit from the current approach at all. If medical care, oxygen and medications are scarce, they will be last in the queue.

Add covid-19 to the mix and you have a toxic mix that will kill in triple fingers within a short time.... yet nobody is concerned about this.

I am concerned! I'm well aware of the TB issue, as I had to get dd tested as a toddler. You're right that the poor have no voice and I doubt that their deaths will even be counted. Letting the current situation in the cities spin out of control is only going to make things worse.

@thirtyrock, you're right that the deaths per million population are tiny compared to ours, but I think the rates are much higher in some areas than others and I suspect that there is a huge issue of under counting. And the numbers are about to explode.

@paralysedbyinertia the poor are not even in the queue for health care for any health issues, they don’t even have access to enough food and clean water, Covid is the last of their worries.

India are in a very difficult position, in a way this has levelled things, as health care, living conditions and vaccinations for the poor also effect the rich health. It is going to be very difficult. I find it very hard to swallow though, this isn’t just at India but the whole world, we’re quite happy to vaccinate the whole world because it effects all of us but we let people starve and not have enough food and water,l.

I’m new to a job and part of my team live in India. I can hear the stress in their voices on our calls each day. Many are off sick with COVID and leaving work for medical family emergencies.

[quote Baileysforchristmas]@paralysedbyinertia the poor are not even in the queue for health care for any health issues, they don’t even have access to enough food and clean water, Covid is the last of their worries.[/quote]
Have you ever been to a government hospital in India, OP? Because I have been to quite a few, and I can assure you that there are an awful lot of poor people in the queue for medical treatment. If those hospitals fill up with the middle classes who would normally go to the private hospital down the road, the poor will feel the impact of that.

@Baileysforchristmas

India are in a very difficult position, in a way this has levelled things, as health care, living conditions and vaccinations for the poor also effect the rich health. It is going to be very difficult. I find it very hard to swallow though, this isn’t just at India but the whole world, we’re quite happy to vaccinate the whole world because it effects all of us but we let people starve and not have enough food and water,l.

Yes, I agree with that. There is a lot of hypocrisy.

I have my entire family in India and there have been night where I am unable to sleep. The condition is so bad. My relatives who are covid positive. I talked to my aunt today and she said two people in her apartment building died this week from covid! People are struggling to get tests because in lot of places government has stopped testing - to underreport the numbers I am sure. In the last one year, the medical facilities weren't prepared at all to handle the covid crisis.
The prime minister of the country actually was conducting political rallies just until a week back! It's unbelievable!
All the hospitals are running at capacity. You will find videos of people lying on hospital floors, and queues of ambulances full of sick people just standing out of the hospital.
I am sure all the numbers are heavily under reported. There are so many people dying!
I don't know how India is going to come out of it..

@Mimmommum that is so sad, your poor family, my heart goes out to everyone there, what an awful situation 💕

The situation in India is horrific. Are the U.K. doing anything to help? Eg sending Oxygen tanks, vaccines etc? I think our focus should be on that now. I wish there were a huge global drive to help countries as soon as these are horrific waves like this. I agree that these waves seem to hit about every six months.

My friends and family there also tell me that so many people they know are Covid Positive. The death rate from Covid in India is going to be horrendous for the foreseeable future.

The Times of India is reporting that they expect to peak in mid-May with around ten times the current cases: m.timesofindia.com/india/indias-covid-19-peak-likely-between-may-11-15-with-33-35-lakh-active-cases-experts/articleshow/82190918.cms. I don't think the current figures are remotely accurate, but can believe it will be ten times whatever they are.

It's an awful situation and the election rallies should have been cancelled, as well as at least discouraging religious festivals. Modi has been incredibly irresponsible, after all this time lessons should have been learned. I don't have a clue what they can do now; wealthier Indians will try to lock themselves away but the unavailability of hospitals will have a huge effect on all and poorer Indians don't have the same ability to shield themselves at all. Having a younger population should give some benefit, but vaccines can't help right now as there isn't time.

@Mimmommum, I'm sorry that you're having such a hard time with this. I hope that your family are all ok.

I can totally relate to the worry. I'm sure you're right about the under-reporting. The numbers being recorded just don't seem to tally with the stories of what's happening on the ground. Like you, I really can't see how India is going to get out of this - it feels out of control. We could be looking at a major catastrophe here.

None of DH's family have been ill so far, but I feel like it's just creeping nearer and nearer. It's horrible. I hope that your family all stay safe.

@MRex. I'm hopeful that having a younger population will help. The median age in India is around 26, which is much lower than ours. However, some of that advantage will be balanced out by poverty, malnutrition, high rates of diabetes etc.

The projections from the Times of India are terrifying. I can't even contemplate what ten times worse might look like.

Thanks @Baileysforchristmas and @paralysedbyinertia.
It's a terrible situation. There are so many requests for oxygen cylinders, blood donors on my social media. My friend's dad is not well and she has been trying to get a covid test since 3 days but she has been told that the government has asked to stop testing. Everyone is just on their own now - praying that they don't need any medical services. It's a very difficult situation for pregnant mothers as well, because most hospitals are refusing admission or need a negative covid test before admitting. So if you are positive and near your due date, you really are stuck with nowhere to go.

scroll.in/article/992933/indias-covid-19-crisis-is-a-product-of-the-paranoid-governance-that-has-marked-the-past-seven-years
A good article to read regarding the situation.

Did aid work in Calcutta&Bihar in early90's..no-one had access to hospital/doctors,people crowded under tarpaulin on streets around cauldrons of rice..tiny toddler-groups begging covered in boils half-blind, OAPcripples on wheely boards and child prostution completely visable-even had to get cops involved in Mamallapuram to some old scandinavian nonce keeping a couple of 9 year old friends as'local hosts'-so seriously covid is just a fucking drop in their ocean..take away all we have in the western world and food,how to get it&how to survive/sleep without being attacked/kidnapped&sold is all that matters.The inequality is mind-blowing.

@Unsure33

Gosh 65%of hospital patients under 40 .

They done have an obesity problem there either do they .

Seriously? "They don't have an obesity problem" is your take away from this?

There are over a billion people, the majority of whom are permanently malnourished/hungry, have little or no access to clean water, live in poor housing conditions, have uncertain working conditions if they have work at all, have no benefits and no pensions, and who live hand to mouth every day of their lives. Commonplace illnesses kill lots of people every year, and there is little access to medical services. And you are surprised they aren't dying because they are obese???

@Mimmommum, that's a good article. Modi has a lot to answer for, but the media doesn't seem to be doing that much to hold him to account. It's shocking that they're just asking people not to test. I guess that's the only way of keeping the numbers down now.

It must indeed be very hard for pregnant women, and actually for anyone who needs hospital treatment for a non-covid illness. No access without testing but no testing available.

Im puzzled about why this spike is only happening now, 13 months or so later. I know there were curfews last year but what kept the virus under control for so long that is not applicable now?

1. People relaxed and decided covid was over. Modi held a rally with crowds without masks, last weekend!!
2. India variant B.1.617 has two mutations making it more infectious, one of those it shares with the Kent variant B.1.1.7, we saw for ourselves how that made a difference in infections.
3. Weather? Bad luck?

John Murdoch-Burn from the financial times who has been doing amazing data work on covid tweeted a very sobering thread yesterday. He used local newspapers to compare the number of deaths and the number of offical covid deaths. He thinks the under reporting is about x10 and its getting worse. So if there are 1700 official deaths, he thinks its closer to 17000 in reality. Its the stuff of nightmares and one of the fears that was had right at the start of the pandemic coming true - that places like India would just collapse. He is saying that Delhi and Mumbai are treating more patients in their ICU departments than Lombardy in Italy and Leige in Belgium had at their peak. Its incomprehensible.

In terms of infrastructure, India has many citizens who are used to a good standard of living in the middle classes. They do normally have access to healthcare. In this situation thats no longer true. Having money might not protect you.

The incident yesterday when they were delivering oxygen and the system failed meaning 22 people on ventilators simply died and many others who are receiving oxygen may yet die as a result was horrific.

I think we've kind of got to the point where most people don't fear covid in the same way as we did. And we take everything thats happened in the last 12 months for granted. India says the opposite.

This is quite a good overview of some of the issues, including why case numbers might be exploding now: www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/how-covid-19-surged-again-in-india

@Palavah, the virus was always bad in India. I am sure many people have died in the last one year from covid and we will never know the real numbers. It has exploded now because it is affecting the younger population as well now and putting them in hospitals. Also, when the prime minister of the country doesn't wear masks and conducts political rallies, what can we really expect!! Add to it, allowing religious festivites to go on like the Kumbh Mela.
Until less that 2 weeks back, weddings with upto 50 attendees was allowed to happen in Mumbai. 50 attendees!! When they also had started with night curfews because of the increasing covid rate. I am sure, it must be similar in other parts of the country. I know about Mumbai specifiaclly because I was invited to one such wedding.
India had one year to work on the medical infrastructure, but the government didn't do anything. Everything is so political in India right now under the current prime minister, that even the vaccine cards have his photo on it!
I think India needs International intervention else millions of people will die.

Thanks for the info

@Unsure33 no obesity is not a huge problem as it is in the Western region however the silent killer for most South East Asian countries are Diabetes and Heart Disease.
An active lifestyle is not something a lot of people follow- lots of the younger generations who work in IT etc spend hours sitting but then most (not all and this thankfully is changing now) don’t spend time in excercises
The older generation again are the same- there needs to be better understanding of good excercises to safety raise your heart rate etc. My mum for example would go for a leisure walk and tick that off as excercise- there needs to be better understanding and education.

Certain societal norms etc don’t help either. The amount of younger generations having heart issues have risen in the recent past- another one is YouTube - there are millions of channel owners in YouTube- to make money you need views. There are loads of food tasting/restaurant review type channels which crop up daily. Unfortunately to get view you eat out everyday- which again ticking time bombs.
Then there is the Westernisation- loads of fast food places have cropped up over the last decade- eating habits changed for the worst
Top it all with selfish politicians-although that is in a similar vein to the rest of the world. Hindu festivals happened which gathered large crowds because the Prime Minister is a divisive individual playing religious politics- elections happened ignoring possible warning again because it benefits the select few....
I could go on but I’ll stop....it is very sad and very scary for the ones who have family there...😢😢