India Only Behind US, Brazil In Virus Deaths

Country sees over 4,454 new deaths; cases of black fungus mount as anti-fungal drugs start to arrive from abroad; farmers protest could be virus, ‘super-spreader,’ warns government

NEW DELHI

India passed 300,000 confirmed coronavirus deaths on Monday, fatalities remaining high despite the country flattening out the number of new cases in its devastating pandemic wave.

It became the third country — after the United States and Brazil — to cross 300,000 deaths.

For several weeks the country of 1.3 billion has been hitting record daily rises in infections and fatalities, that have overwhelmed its healthcare system.

While the crisis has eased in major cities such as New Delhi and Mumbai, the coronavirus is still spreading in rural areas and southern states.

Another 4,454 deaths in 24 hours - the second-highest daily figure so far - took India’s toll to 303,720. It has added the last 50,000 deaths in under two weeks, according to government figures. Experts said the real numbers of deaths and infections, now 26.7 million, were probably much higher than the official figures.

The brutal wave has been accompanied by the emergence among coronavirus patients of thousands of cases of the usually rare infection mucormycosis, or “black fungus.”