Record deaths, infections sweep away Indian hopes

Indians were jolted by record jumps in coronavirus infections and deaths on Thursday, dashing tentative hopes that the country's deadly second wave of the pandemic was easing.

Health ministry numbers showed 3,980 deaths in the latest 24-hour period and 412,262 new cases－records on both counts.

Sri Lanka on Thursday became the latest of India's neighbors to seal its borders with the South Asian country in response to the outbreak.

Bangladesh and Nepal have also banned flights and sought to close their borders with India, where a huge rise in numbers in the past three weeks has taken deaths past 230,000 and cases over 21 million.

With the government facing criticism as patients die outside hospitals, consignments of oxygen and equipment have been arriving from abroad.

"We did not and do not have enough oxygen," a top government official said, speaking on condition of anonymity."If we could get more oxygen more lives would be saved."

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies has called for urgent international action to prevent "a worsening human catastrophe" across South Asia. It highlighted the case of Nepal, where it said "many hospitals are full and overflowing" with patients and the daily caseload is 57 times higher than one month ago.

Agencies via Xinhua