India recently has been hit with a deadly second wave of COVID-19. This wave is more contagious with almost 2,000 people dying everyday. The question is why did cases rise all of a sudden?
What is the current situation?
Ever since India was hit with the second wave of COVID all hospitals around India have had a shortage of ICU beds and oxygen tanks.
Shamshar Singh says, “My friend’s father passed away because his oxygen tank shut off… it ran out of oxygen and my friend watched his father gasp for air… he watched his father die and he couldn’t do anything.”
People are dying because oxygen, doctors, and ICU beds are not available. Some hospitals won’t even look at patients because of how packed it is. Families are cremating their loved ones on sides of roads, and in some places dead bodies are piling up. Funerals take place in parking lots as crematoriums are completely filled. India has broken the record for having 17 million + cases and over 190,000 deaths. Hospitals are fully packed, with people having to sit in cars just to be on oxygen support. Healthcare is fully collapsing. Badly affected cities like Delhi, Ahmedabad, and Mumbai have patients laying on the floors while being on oxygen support.
Sarabjit Kaur said, “ some people begged doctors for around 10 hours so their loved ones could be seen or accepted into care.”
Vaccination in India
As of right now, only 1.6% of people in India are vaccinated. The world’s largest vaccine maker is India and their people aren’t fully vaccinated. President Joe Biden says the US will help support and provide emergency assistance and resources for India. Biden says, “ India was there for us, and we will be there for them.” (quoted from his twitter)
How did the outbreak get so contagious and bad?
Shamshar Singh says, “Modi wasted time, the government wasted time. The government made vaccines for foreign countries, but they failed to help their own people get vaccinated first.” If we compare last year to this year when COVID first started spreading, India went on a complete lockdown. The prime minister of India Narendra Modi had said, “Every state, every district, every lane, every village will be under lockdown.” If you look into this year the government relaxed the rules for the past 2 months. Cases started to drop so Modi ignored signs of a potential second wave. People in India had gone back to their normal lives. Narendra Modi let the gathering happen with over thousand of people.
Modi also let political parties hold gigantic rallies during a pandemic. On twitter Modi has been getting a lot of backlash, people are use hashtags like #reaignModi to criticize the government. Narendra Modi responded to all this hate by telling Twitter to filter out the criticism of the government. Simran Kaur said, “Sounds like Modi is trying to stop the spread of hate rather than COVID.”
Countries like the US are willing to help India. If India is badly affected with a second wave, US and other countries can be affected as well. Other countries should also help India get better before it’s a problem for the rest of the world. Even though cases started to rise a lot, BJP Telangana (current government party) had political campaign rallies with over thousands of people. It just shows the government cares more about their rallies than the innocent lives of their own citizens.
Sarabjit Kaur said, “Families are being torn apart every second, skies are turning orange with funerals happening every second, my motherland is dying… India is dying.”
