India’s COVID disaster hanging over countries facing outbreaks
SOHAG, Egypt — Countries worldwide wrestling with new coronavirus surges are trying to ensure they aren’t hit by an Indiastyle disaster. They face many of the same risks, including large populations that have shirked restrictions and fragile health systems shaken under the strain.
In a province along the Nile in southern Egypt, hospitals have been flooded with COVID-19 patients, a main hot spot in a third spike swelling across the country. Doctors in Sohag province warn the health system there could collapse, even as the government rushes in new supplies.
“My estimate is that there is no family in Sohag that does not have a corona case,” said Dr. Mahmoud Fahmy Mansour, head of the province’s doctors’ union. “We lost five physicians in one week.”
Long reluctant to impose new lockdowns, Egypt’s government announced its strictest restrictions in months on Wednesday. It ordered cafes, restaurants, stores and malls to close at 9 p.m. and banned large gatherings for two weeks, as well as shutting down beaches and parks during the upcoming Eid el-Fitr holiday at the end of the holy month of Ramadan. Egypt isn’t alone in seeing mounting new infections. Worldwide, more cases have been reported in the past two weeks than in the entire first six months of the pandemic, World Health Organization director general Tedros Adhanom said.
India and Brazil accounted for a large part of that, “but there are many other countries all over the world that face a very fragile situation,” he said. “What is happening in India and Brazil could happen elsewhere unless we all take these public health precautions.”
India has been hit by a catastrophic surge of COVID-19 infections after its prime minister boasted of vanquishing the pandemic and following multiple massive crowding events. New cases and deaths skyrocketed nearly 30-fold during March and April. The health system has been overwhelmed, leaving patients desperate for oxygen and other supplies.
Wealthier nations, as they immunize more of their populations, are finding room to open up. But countries where vaccination has been slow or minimal face grimmer prospects. They must grapple with whether to lock down to thwart new surges and risk damaging their economies — all with the possibility of an India-style tragedy looming.
In Turkey, new cases surged nearly six-fold from the beginning of March, reaching a peak of more than 60,000 a day. The government imposed a three-week national lockdown on April 29 but exempted many sectors, allowing millions to keep going to work.
Numbers have fallen, but medical experts are calling for a 28-day full closure of all nonessential services, while only some 10 million of its more than 80 million people have been fully vaccinated.
“These restrictions were not the restrictions we called for,” said Vedat Bulut, secretary-general of the independent Turkish Medical Association.
In the crowded Palestinian enclave of the Gaza Strip, home to 2 million people, cases have risen swiftly. In March and April, infection rates surpassed 1,000 a day — the number Gaza previously recorded weekly. Daily deaths have doubled to a high of 20. The virus has killed more than 900 Gazans and sickened over 102,000, more than half of them this year.
Amid concerns over India, Kenya, which is coming down from a recent peak, halted flights with the country for two weeks, while Nigeria suspended flights with India, Brazil and Turkey, fearing new virus strains could come in as it tries to bring down cases, particularly in Lagos, home to some 20 million people.
In South Africa, with by far the largest number of COVID-19 cases and deaths in Africa, officials warn of a new surge as the Southern Hemisphere’s winter approaches.
Pakistan is in the midst of a third wave, with single-day fatalities hitting their highest of the entire pandemic on April 28, with 201 deaths.
Health officials added hundreds more hospital beds. Oxygen production had already been nearly doubled to 800 tons a day compared with last year.
New cases have eased slightly this week from a running average of around 6,000 a day.
“Thank God, we have so far managed to cope with this huge increase because of proactively building capacity of the entire system,” Planning and Development Minister Asad Umar said.
But he warned the country of more than 200 million could face an India-level disaster unless people adhere to precautions that have been widely ignored.
“Be careful. For yourself, and your loved ones,” he said in a tweet.