Death and dismay as India grieves 200,000-plus coronavirus victims
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Three days after his coronavirus symptoms appeared, Rajendra Karan struggled to breathe. Instead of waiting for an ambulance, his son drove him to a government hospital in Lucknow, the capital of India鈥檚 largest state of Uttar Pradesh.
But the hospital wouldn鈥檛 let him in without a registration slip from the district鈥檚 chief medical officer. By the time the son got it, his father had died in the car, just outside the hospital doors. 鈥淢y father would have been alive today if the hospital had just admitted him instead of waiting for a piece of paper,鈥 Rohitas Karan said.
Stories of deaths tangled in bureaucracy and system failure have become dismally common in India, where deaths yesterday officially surged past 200,000. But the figure is likely far lower than the true count.
In India, mortality data was poor even before the pandemic, with most people dying at home and their deaths often going unregistered. The practice is particularly prevalent in rural areas, where the virus is spreading fast. This is partly why the nation of nearly 1.4 billion has recorded fewer deaths than Brazil and Mexico, which have smaller populations and fewer confirmed COVID-19 cases.
While determining exact numbers in a pandemic is difficult, experts say an overreliance on official data that didn鈥檛 reflect the true extent of infections contributed to authorities being blindsided by a massive surge in recent weeks.
鈥淧eople who could have been saved are dying now,鈥 said Gautam Menon, a professor of physics and biology at Ashoka University, who said there has been 鈥渟erious undercounting鈥 of deaths in many states.
India had thought the worst was over when cases ebbed in September. But infections began increasing in February, and yesterday, 362,757 new cases, a new global record, raised its total confirmed cases past 17.9 million, second only to the United States.
Media have reported discrepancies between official state tallies of the dead and actual numbers of bodies in crematoriums and burial grounds. Many crematoriums have spilled over into parking lots and other empty spaces as blazing funeral pyres light up night skies.
India鈥檚 daily deaths, which have nearly tripled in the last three weeks, also reflect a shattered and underfunded health care system. Hospitals are scrambling for more oxygen, beds, ventilators and ambulances while families marshal their own resources in the absence of a functioning system.
Jitender Singh Shunty runs an ambulance service in New Delhi transporting COVID-19 victims鈥 bodies to a temporary crematorium in a parking lot. He said those who die at home are generally unaccounted for in state tallies, while the number of bodies have increased from 10 to nearly 50 daily.
鈥淲hen I go home, my clothes smell of burnt flesh. I have never seen so many dead bodies in my life,鈥 Shunty said.
Burial grounds are also filling up fast. The capital鈥檚 largest Muslim graveyard is running out of space, said Mohammad Shameem, the head gravedigger.
In southern Telangana state too, doctors and activists are contesting the official death counts.
On April 23, the state said 33 people had died of COVID-19. But between 80 to 100 people died in just two hospitals in the state鈥檚 capital, Hyderabad, the day before. It鈥檚 unclear whether all were due to the virus, but experts say COVID-19 deaths aren鈥檛 being listed as such.
Instead, many are attributed to underlying conditions despite national guidelines asking states to record all suspected virus deaths, including 鈥減resumptive deaths鈥 鈥 those who likely died of COVID-19 but weren鈥檛 tested for it.
For instance, New Delhi officially recorded 4,000 COVID-19 deaths by August 31, but this didn鈥檛 include suspected deaths, according to data accessed under a right-to-information request. Fatalities have since more than tripled to over 14,500. Officials didn鈥檛 respond to queries on whether suspected deaths were now being included.
In Lucknow, officials said 39 people died of the virus in the city on Tuesday. But Suresh Chandra, who operates its Bhaisakhund electric crematorium, said his team had cremated 58 COVID-19 bodies by Tuesday evening, and another 28 bodies were cremated at a nearby crematorium the same day.
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