Discovery of bodies in Ganges stokes fear that virus is raging in rural areas

NEW DELHI • The authorities in northern India yesterday said they have put up a net across the Ganges River after the bodies of suspected Covid-19 victims were found washed up on the banks.

The discovery of 71 bodies in Bihar state has stoked fears that the virus is raging unseen in India's vast rural hinterland where two-thirds of its people live.

Locals told AFP they suspect that relatives of the dead immersed the bodies in the river because they could not afford wood for traditional Hindu cremations or because crematoriums were overwhelmed by the number of funerals.

Bihar's water resources minister Sanjay Kumar said on Twitter that a "net has been placed" in the river on the state's border with Uttar Pradesh and patrolling increased. He said the impoverished state's government was "pained at both the tragedy as well as harm to the Ganges".

Mr Kumar added that postmortems confirmed that the corpses had been dead four to five days. Press reports said as many as 25 bodies had also been recovered in the Gahmar district of Uttar Pradesh state.

The Hindu daily quoted a local police official as saying there were long queues at cremation grounds in the northern state. "It is possible that in a hurry, some disposed of the bodies in the river like this," the official said.

Meanwhile, states in southern India have threatened to stop sharing medical oxygen with one another, fiercely protective about holding on to whatever they have as their hospitals swell with the sick and infections skyrocket.

At one hospital in Andhra Pradesh, a rural state in the country's south-east, furious relatives went on a rampage in the intensive care unit after lifesaving oxygen suddenly ran out. It was just the latest example of the same tragedy repeating itself - of patients dying while gasping for air.

The desperation that engulfed New Delhi, India's capital, over the past few weeks is now spreading across the country, hitting states and rural areas, many of which have fewer resources.

Positivity rates are soaring in those states, and public health experts say that the rising numbers most likely fall far short of giving the true picture in places where sickness and deaths caused by Covid-19 are harder to track.

Every day, the Indian media delivers a heavy dose of turmoil and grief. On Tuesday, it was televised images of distraught relatives furiously beating the chests of loved ones who had died after the oxygen ran out, and headlines including "Bodies of suspected Covid-19 victims found floating" and "As deaths go up 10 fold, worrying signs from smaller states".

This was always the burning question: If New Delhi, home to the country's elite and scores of hospitals, could not handle the surge of coronavirus cases from a devastating new wave, what would happen in poorer rural areas?

The answer is now coming in.

On Monday night, the Sri Venkateswara Ramnarain Ruia Government General Hospital in Andhra Pradesh was running low on medical oxygen.

More than 60 patients were in critical condition, oxygen masks strapped to their faces. Doctors frantically called suppliers for help. But the oxygen ran out, killing 11 people.

Distraught family members became so enraged, hospital officials said, that they rushed into the intensive care unit, flipped over tables and smashed equipment.

Televised images showed women clutching their heads, overwhelmed by grief.

Doctors and nurses fled until police officers arrived.

At the same time, the national vaccine campaign is spluttering. The roughly two million doses that have been administered daily over the past few days are lower than the highs a few weeks ago, when some days the country gave out more than three million doses.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, NYTIMES