NEW DELHI: After a day’s dip, the brutal second wave of Coronavirus continued with its onslaught, crossing the grim milestone of 2 lakh fatalities. It also recorded a new high of 3,60,960 cases in a single day in 24 hours ending at 8 AM, while the deaths hit the highest single-day tally of 3,293. India has seen more Covid cases in the last seven days than any other country, though experts believe the actual number is much higher.
According to experts, the true toll could be double that or even higher as official agencies only count those who die in hospitals, and not the many patients left to die at home or in the streets. Also, some states are not logging fatalities as Covid-related if there is a comorbidity that contributed to the death.
According to Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, the wave is being driven by a ‘supremely contagious’ variant of the disease which is causing more severe cases that take longer to recover from.
In a dismal state of affairs, Delhi began converting dog crematorium sites to deal with Covid fatalities; this is in addition to public parks, car parking lots, and abandoned plots which are being used to dispose of the pile of bodies.
Maharashtra, which witnessed a drop in daily fatalities to 524, showed the highest 895 deaths in the past 24 hours, followed by Delhi 381, Rajasthan 321, Uttar Pradesh 264, Gujarat 170, Karnataka 180 and Punjab 100. The positivity rate in Delhi stood t 32.72% as per the latest bulletin of Delhi government. This was the sixth day that Delhi recorded more than 300 deaths due to Coronavirus. The Health Ministry said Maharashtra also reported the highest 66,358 infections in 24 hours, pushing the tally of total infections to 44.10 lakh and the death toll of 66,179.
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