NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Indians struggled to register online for a mass vaccination drive set to begin at the weekend as the country\u2019s toll from the coronavirus surged past 200,000 on Wednesday, worsened by shortages of hospital beds and medical oxygen.<\/p>\n
The second wave of infections has seen at least 300,000 people test positive each day for the past week, overwhelming health facilities and crematoriums and prompting an increasingly urgent response from allies overseas sending equipment.<\/p>\n
The last 24 hours brought 360,960 new cases for the world\u2019s largest single-day total, taking India\u2019s tally of infections to nearly 18 million. It was also the deadliest day so far, with 3,293 fatalities carrying the toll to 201,187.<\/p>\n
Experts believe the official tally vastly underestimates the actual toll in a nation of 1.35 billion, however.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe situation is horrific, absolutely terrible … Everyone is afraid, every single person. People are afraid that if I am talking to a person, maybe I won\u2019t get to talk to them tomorrow or in the near future,\u201d New Delhi resident Manoj Garg said.<\/p>\n
Delhi state is reporting one death from COVID-19 every four minutes and ambulances have been taking the bodies of COVID-19 victims to makeshift crematorium facilities in parks and parking lots, where bodies burned on rows and rows of funeral pyres.<\/p>\n
Mohammad Shameem, the head grave digger at Delhi\u2019s biggest graveyard, said: \u201cEarlier we had enough space here but now there is no space left. Whatever little gaps we have left, we are trying to fill them up now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Genesis hospital in the Delhi suburb of Gurgaon told families to take patients away because its supplies of life-saving oxygen were depleting fast, one family said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe hospital is trying to get fresh oxygen but we are told we have to make alternate arrangements,\u201d said Anjali Cerejo, whose father had been admitted but now has to try to find another bed elsewhere.<\/p>\n
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