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Virus Is Emerging in New Hotspots as India Races Past 1 Million Mark

Anjana Pasricha

   NEW DELHI - As India races past the 1 million mark of COVID 19 cases,
   public health experts warn that the pandemic is set to accelerate with
   the emergence of new hotspots in places that so far had escaped the
   ravages of the virus, including its vast countryside.

   More than half the cases were added in the last fortnight as the
   country reached a record high of nearly 35,000 cases in recent days.
   Even these numbers could be off the mark as testing remains sparse in a
   country of 1.3 billion say public health experts.

   "From my perspective, it is gross underreporting, my hunch is that
   numbers would be much larger," according to Kapil Yadav, assistant
   professor of Community Medicine at the premier All India Institute of
   Medical Sciences in New Delhi. "It will run its course and we may or
   may not see the typical peak we have seen in Western developed
   countries."

   That is because in the vast country, different places are seeing surges
   at different times -- while Delhi and the states of Maharashtra and
   Tamil Nadu accounted for a bulk of the cases until recently, infections
   now are spiralling in cities like Bengaluru and the northeastern state
   of Bihar, home to more than 100 million people and one of India's
   poorest states.

   Virologists who had warned that the highly contagious coronavirus will
   hit like an avalanche in a country of densely packed cities and huge
   urban slums where social distancing is impossible, say India's long and
   stringent 10-week lockdown only delayed the onset of the pandemic, but
   could not stop it.

   The virus has marched on since cities began opening in June -- markets
   are up and running and many businesses are open.

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