India ‘on Covid war footing’

Cases exceed 24m as mutant variant drives contagion in countryside

Prime Minister Narendra Modi sounded the alarm on Friday over the rapid spread of the coronavirus through India’s vast countryside as the official tally of infections passed 24million, and 4,000 people died for the third straight day.

The highly transmissible B.1.617 variant of the coronavirus first detected in India is also spreading across the globe, and Modi said his government was “on a war footing” in its fight against the contagion.

“The outbreak is reaching rural areas with great speed,” Modi said, addressing a group of farmers in a virtual conference.

Though about two-thirds of Indians live in rural towns and villages where healthcare facilities are meagre, it was the first time Modi has specifically referred to the spread of the virus in the countryside since a second wave of the epidemic erupted in February.

Indian health ministry data show 4,000 deaths and 343,144 infections over the past 24 hours.

It was the third consecutive day of 4,000 deaths or more, but daily infections have kept below last week’s peak of 414,188.

The tally of infections since the pandemic first struck India more than a year ago exceeded 24-million, and the death toll stood at 262,317.

But experts said a lack of testing in many places, particularly rural areas, meant the official count grossly underestimated the true scale of the crisis.

Television channels have broadcast images of families weeping over the dead in rural hospitals or camping in wards to tend to the sick. Bodies have washed up in the Ganges, the river that flows through the country’s most populous states, as crematoriums are overwhelmed and wood for funeral pyres is in short supply.

“We are removing all obstacles that are in the way of any resources we need in this fight,” Modi said. “Work is being done on a war footing.”

The Indian B.1.617 variant has been found in eight nations in the Americas, including Canada and the US, said Jairo Mendez, an infectious diseases expert with the World Health Organisation.

It has spread to the Himalayan nation of Nepal and also been detected in Britain and tiny Singapore. Public Health England said the total number of infections due to the variant had more than doubled in the past week, to 1,313 across Britain.

We are removing all obstacles that are in the way of any resources we need