As India’s COVID-19 crisis worsen, two people share a bed in Delhi hospital

Gasping for air, two men wearing oxygen masks share a bed in a government hospital in India’s capital New Delhi, victims of the country’s growing COVID-19 crisis.

From reporting under 10,000 new daily cases earlier this year, daily infections crossed 200,000 on Thursday (Apr 15), according to official data, the highest anywhere in the world.

At Lok Nayak Jai Prakash Narayan Hospital, one of India’s largest coronavirus-only facilities with more than 1,500 beds, a stream of ambulances ferried patients to the overflowing casualty ward on Thursday.

Some also arrived in buses and three-wheeled auto-rickshaws.

The youngest patient was a newborn baby.

From an initial 54 beds, the hospital now has more than 300 COVID-19 patients in critical condition. Even that is not enough.

Unrelated patients share beds, while bodies of the recently deceased lie outside the ward before being taken to the mortuary.