New Delhi: The death toll due to COVID-19 in India – swept by the deadly second wave of infection – has surpassed the three-lakh mark.
With the count of deaths breaching three lakhs, India has become the third country to cross the grim landmark after the United States and Brazil. The United States is the worst-hit country by coronavirus with 5,89,703 deaths, followed by Brazil with 448,208 fatalities.
India has been reporting thousands of deaths over the last several weeks, leading to crippling shortages of medical oxygen and hospital beds in several parts of the country. Nearly 1,00,000 deaths due to coronavirus have been reported in May alone.
The daily rise in coronavirus cases in India pushed the total caseload to 2,65,30,132, with 2.4 lakh new cases recorded in a single day on Sunday.
While the Centre that has been under sharp criticism over its handling of the COVID-19 situation attribute the unprecedented rise in cases to the mutant variants of the virus and people’s laxity, experts believe that the recently-held events like the Kumbh Mela and Assembly elections led to the spike in infections.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi earlier this week had an emotional moment while remembering people who lost their lives to COVID-19.
Interacting with healthcare professionals and other frontline workers in his Varanasi constituency through a video conference, PM Modi choked with emotions briefly as he noted that the virus has snatched so many of our near ones.
Earlier this month, Principal Scientific Advisor to the Centre K Vijay Raghavan had said that the third wave of COVID-19 infection is inevitable, given the higher levels of circulating virus.
