Friday, April 30, 2021

U.S. restricting travel from India amid raging COVID outbreak - CBS News

U.S. restricting travel from India amid raging COVID outbreak - CBS News I hope it's not too late. I guess we might see what this mutation will do to the anti-mask, vaccine-hesitant residents of the United States. The phrase "hot knife through butter" comes to mind.

Thursday, April 29, 2021

We are witnessing a crime against humanity

We are witnessing a crime against humanity Finally, the message came: “Father’s dead.” He did not die of Covid, but of a massive spike in blood pressure induced by a psychiatric meltdown induced by utter helplessness. What to do with the body? I desperately called everybody I knew. Among those who responded was Anirban Bhattacharya, who works with the well-known social activist Harsh Mander. Bhattacharya is about to stand trial on a charge of sedition for a protest he helped organise on his university campus in 2016. Mander, who has not fully recovered from a savage case of Covid last year, is being threatened with arrest and the closure of the orphanages he runs after he mobilised people against the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) passed in December 2019, both of which blatantly discriminate against Muslims. Mander and Bhattacharya are among the many citizens who, in the absence of all forms of governance, have set up helplines and emergency responses, and are running themselves ragged organising ambulances and coordinating funerals and the transport of dead bodies. It’s not safe for these volunteers to do what they’re doing. In this wave of the pandemic, it’s the young who are falling, who are filling the intensive care units. When young people die, the older among us lose a little of our will to live.

Wednesday, April 28, 2021

India Is What Happens When Rich People Do Nothing - The Atlantic

India Is What Happens When Rich People Do Nothing - The Atlantic India’s economic liberalization in the ’90s brought with it a rapid expansion of the private health-care industry, a shift that ultimately created a system of medical apartheid: World-class private hospitals catered to wealthy Indians and medical tourists from abroad; state-run facilities were for the poor. Those with money were able to purchase the best available care (or, in the case of the absolute richest, flee to safety in private jets), while elsewhere the country’s health-care infrastructure was held together with duct tape. The Indians who bought their way to a healthier life did not, or chose not to, see the widening gulf. Today, they are clutching their pearls as their loved ones fail to get ambulances, doctors, medicine, and oxygen.

The%20most%20promising%20coronavirus%20vaccine%20you%u2019ve%20never%20heard%20of%20-%20POLITICO

For the U.S., the Novavax shot could serve as an insurance policy in case supplies of the two mRNA vaccines — the workhorses of the country’s vaccination push — or the J&J shot falter. But many countries are not so fortunate. Thirty one percent of the billion vaccine doses administered worldwide have gone to North America, and just under 2 percent have gone to Africa.

Tuesday, April 27, 2021

Drone images of mass cremations as India battles Covid-19 - YouTube

Drone images of mass cremations as India battles Covid-19 - YouTube Disturbing drone footage of open air crematoriums in India.

India's Massive Surge Puzzles Scientists

India%u2019s%20massive%20COVID%20surge%20puzzles%20scientists “The second wave has made the last one look like a ripple in a bathtub,” says Zarir Udwadia, a clinician-researcher in pulmonary medicine at P D Hinduja Hospital & Medical Research Centre in Mumbai, who spoke to Nature during a break from working in the intensive-care unit. He describes a “nightmarish” situation at hospitals, where beds and treatments are in extremely short supply.

COVID swallowing people in India as crematoriums overwhelmed

COVID swallowing people in India as crematoriums overwhelmed

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