India and Thailand reported record daily cases of coronavirus on Thursday, as a new wave of infections, combined with a lack of hospital beds and vaccines, threatens to slow Asia’s recovery from the pandemic.
India breached 200,000 daily infections for the first time on Thursday, and the financial center in Mumbai went into a deadlock as many hospitals reported lack of beds and oxygen supplies.
“The situation is horrible. We are a 900-bed hospital, but there are about 60 patients waiting and we have no room for them,” said Avinash Gawande, an official at Nagpur Medical College and Government Hospital, a hub advertising in Maharashtra .
The increase was the seventh record daily increase in eight days and brings the total number of cases to 14.1 million, second only to the United States.
Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims gathered on Wednesday for a religious holiday in the north of the country, sparking fears of a further rise in COVID-19 cases.
Growing infections have also put pressure on the health care system in Manila and Bangkok.
The Philippines has seen many hospitals in its capital region, housing about 13 million people, filling up as cases grow. Only the confirmed cases of coronavirus in the last 30 days have reached 266,489, representing 30% of all infections in the country.
Some families of patients with COVID-19 went on social networks to share their attempts to find hospitals. Some traveled outside the capital to find a medical institution or spent hours in line.
Thailand reported 1,543 new cases of coronavirus on Thursday, the strongest increase since the beginning of the pandemic and the fourth record increase this week. Read more
The increase has increased the occupancy rate of hospital beds, as all positive cases must be admitted to care according to Thai rules. In total, 8,973 patients are treated.
While the country is considering blocking measures, its neighbor Cambodia on Thursday imposed a blockade on its capital and a satellite district on Thursday, as an outbreak that began in late February, and cases have risen nearly tenfold to 4,874. within two months. Read more
Bangladesh also began a one-week blockade with strict restrictions on Wednesday as infections reached about 7,000 cases a day in the past two weeks, down from 300 in February.
SHORT VACCINE
As the divide between developed countries and developing countries’ access to COVID-19 vaccines increases, the head of the World Trade Organization (WTO) on Wednesday called on vaccine manufacturers to increase technology transfer to bring production capacity.
Thailand, for example, vaccinated 0.4% of its population, targeting neighbors such as Singapore with 14.6%, according to a Reuters estimate.
Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, who became director general of the WTO in March, also called on its members to reduce restrictions on vaccine exports and work to facilitate logistical and customs procedures.
In Australia, which abandoned its inoculation target earlier this week, following shipping delays and recently imposed restrictions on the use of AstraZeneca (AZN.L) fire, an association of leading doctors opposed a government plan to create hubs. mass inoculation, citing logistical challenges. Read more
“You have to find a workforce somewhere and we are not aware of the large number of nurses and registered doctors who are available to manage these centers,” Australian Medical Association (WADA) President Omar Khorshid told local radio .
Japan, whose inoculation rate has been hit by limited resources, could cancel the Tokyo Olympics this year if the coronavirus crisis gets too severe, a senior ruling party official said on Thursday, less than 100 days before the planned start of the games. Read more
“If it seems impossible to do it again, then we must stop, decisively,” Toshihiro Nikai, the secretary general of the Liberal Democratic Party, told TBS.
Japan is facing an increase in coronavirus infections, with numbers rising in Tokyo after the government put an end to the state of emergency and Osaka is suffering a record number of cases.
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