Fatalities rose by 2,104 in the past 24 hours, raising India’s overall death toll to 184,657, the Health Ministry said.
NEW DELHI — India reported a global record of more than 314,000 new infections Thursday as a grim coronavirus surge hits the world’s second-most populous country, sending more and more sick people into a fragile health care system critically short of hospital beds and oxygen.
The 314,835 infections added in the past 24 hours raise India’s total past 15.9 million cases since the pandemic began. It’s the second-highest total in the world next to the United States. India has nearly 1.4 billion people.
A large number of hospitals are reporting acute shortages of beds and medicine and are running on dangerously low levels of oxygen.
India has launched a vaccination drive but only a tiny fraction of the population has had the shots.
“The second wave is a consequence of complacency and mixing and mass gatherings. You don’t need a variant to explain the second wave,” said Ramanan Laxminarayan of the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy in New Delhi.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/india-sets-world-record-new-covid-cases-314k-n1264895