New Delhi of India is blocked as Covid-19 extends its limits to the healthcare system

“I’m not saying the system has collapsed, but it has reached its limits,” he said.

The latest wave of cases has risen much faster than the country’s rise in months last year, moving the country to the center of a pandemic that has killed at least three million people across the country. world. India has reported more than 200,000 new infections daily for five days in a row, with a figure exceeding 270,000 on Monday.

On Monday, Delhi reported 25,463 infections in the last 24 hours, nearly three times the daily high of 8,500 cases during a November peak.

From 22:00 local time, shops and businesses were forced to close and people’s movements were limited to accessing and providing essential services. Some states, including Maharashtra, which hosts the financial capital of Mumbai, have already imposed curfews and limited meetings to a maximum of four people. Shopping malls, restaurants, bars and places of worship have been closed in some places, but New Delhi is the first to re-impose austerity measures like the ones used last spring.

The rapidly rising figures have also added urgency to one of the world’s largest vaccination campaigns. India has administered 120 million doses to its population of about 1.4 billion. On Monday, the government said it would extend vaccines to all those over the age of 18 from May 1. Doses had previously been restricted to people 45 years of age or older.

Public health experts noted a combination of factors that drove the increase, including the circulation of new variants that appear to be more infectious than the original virus and the relaxation of precautions such as wearing masks and social distancing as the number of cases fell in recent months. .

“We have just dropped the guard,” said Dr Amir Ullah Khan, research director at the Center for Development Policy and Practice, a Hyderabad-based think tank.

Dr Khan pointed to possible widespread events, such as the recent political rallies held before the state elections in West Bengal, which have attracted tens of thousands of people, mostly without masks. Hundreds of thousands of devout Hindus have flocked along the Ganges this month on the occasion of the Kumbh Mela festival, during which people bathe in the river to wash away their sins.

“No political leader was ever seen wearing a mask or even talking about it,” Dr. Khan said. “The signal that came out was that‘ it’s all over. We have recovered. ”

Several highly contagious variants of the original coronavirus have also circulated throughout the country. Last month, the Indian Ministry of Health said variants from the UK, South Africa and Brazil had been found in samples collected, along with a new “double mutant variant” that could have originated in India.

By mid-April, the UK variant had become the dominant variant in the northern state of Punjab, public health experts said. The double mutant variant had taken over the most common in the state of Maharashtra.

Little is known so far about the double mutant variant, which gets its name because it has two mutations seen separately in other variants but not in the same variant. The variant has been detected in 21 countries, according to researchers from four universities who monitor viral lineages. Genetic sequencing has spawned cases in the United States, Germany, Turkey, and Nigeria, among others.

Doctors in India say they see differences in both the rate of spread of infections in the population and the age of people presenting to hospitals, with more young people affected this time.

“This wave is huge,” said Dr Parv Mittal, a doctor at a private hospital in Delhi. “Before, the elderly became infected. This time, it is the youngest population at risk ”.

Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan, Delhi’s largest government hospital, is home to young adults and children with high fever and severe body aches and different levels of consciousness, said Dr Suresh Kumar, the hospital’s medical superintendent.

Indian doctors and public health experts say they are working with huge gaps in their knowledge because the government is not doing enough to follow up or conduct research on new variants.

“Clinically, we believe the virus could have become more infectious,” said Dr. Sunil Arora, who works at a government hospital and serves as secretary general of the Federation of Resident Physicians Association. “But we don’t have enough data or evidence to establish the exact reasons for the current increase.”

Most Delhi hospitals are strained under a wave of Covid-19 patients. More than 80% of the city’s 19,322 Covid-19 beds are occupied.

Mr Kejriwal, Delhi’s prime minister, said the blockade of the city is intended to suppress the speed of transmission and allow time to organize more oxygen, medicines and fans.

The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Boris Johnson, canceled a planned visit to India scheduled for the end of this month due to the deteriorating situation. The UK said from Friday it will deny entry to anyone arriving from India, with exceptions for British and Irish citizens and people of any nationality long-term residents.

On Monday, in the Delhi district, in the Defense Colony, cars clogged the parking lot of a local market while people rushed to pick up supplies to drop at home. Lines are formed outside a local pharmacy and mom and pop grocery stores. Cars blocked the exits to the parking lots, with drivers blowing their horns.

After a nationwide shutdown last year hit India’s economy, the government has shown little desire to repeat such drastic measures. Instead, each state has been left with its own way of dealing with outbreaks. Following this new closure in Delhi, experts said it could follow a cascade of other Indian states.

“He will encourage other chief ministers to do the same,” Dr Khan said.

—Jason Douglas in London contributed to this article.

Write to Vibhuti Agarwal at [email protected] and Shan Li at [email protected]