Top photo: A relative places a sari over the body of a loved one, who died of Covid, before cremation
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UPDATED: May 12, 2021 23:43 IST
A relative places a sari over the body of a loved one, who died of Covid, at an open crematorium on the outskirts of Bengaluru, Karnataka. The ritual is part of the Hindu funeral customs. (AP Photo/Aijaz Rahi)
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Posted byRoshni Majumdar
The world is watching in horror as the death count soars during India’s deadly second wave of COVID-19. Countless Indians are gasping for breath due to oxygen shortages across the country, but in the face of a colossal government failure to plan for and handle the crisis, it’s everyday Indians who are putting themselves at risk to save lives.
Each day, India is setting world records for the most number of cases, reporting more than 400,000 alone on May 1. And as daily cases climb, experts believe there’s a huge discrepancy between the official count of deaths and the actual number.
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A health worker takes a nasal swab sample of a person to test for COVID-19 as others wait for their turn outside a field hospital in Mumbai, India, Thursday, May 6, 2021. Infections in India hit another grim daily record on Thursday as demand for medical oxygen jumped seven-fold and the government denied reports that it was slow in distributing life-saving supplies from abroad. (AP Photo/Rajanish kakade)
JTA Nissim Pingle, the head of Mumbai’s Jewish community center, hasn’t left his home since March.
That’s when COVID-19 began to overtake India. A second wave of infections has overwhelmed its health system and is producing a daily death toll of at least 4,000. The country is on track to have the world’s highest death toll by far, as stories pile up of people succumbing to the disease because they cannot access oxygen or hospital beds.
MIDDLETOWN - A man who injured his leg while hiking Saturday in Hartshorne Woods Park needed the help of a technical rescue team, which lowered him down a steep slope to a boat waiting on the Navesink River.
The man and two other people were hiking down an unmarked or “rogue” trail in the Rocky Point part of the park about 11:30 a.m. when the man fell, said Karen Livingstone, spokeswoman for the Monmouth County Park System.
“They were new to Hartshorne,” she said.
The park has more than 14 miles of trails through its nearly 800 acres and is bordered to the south by the Navesink River. It may be situated in the suburbs, but it can be deceptively challenging, even treacherous.
Planeloads of ventilators, oxygen supplies and antiviral drugs began arriving last week, with photos showing massive parcels being unloaded at New Delhi airport.
There s just one problem: for many days, much of the cargo sat in airport hangars as hospitals on the ground pleaded for more provisions.
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Indians walked the streets to refill their own oxygen tanks as aid waited in airport hangars.(AP)
Medical workers and local officials are still reporting the same devastating shortages that have strained the health care system for weeks now â raising questions, even among foreign donors, of where the aid is going.