As India’s coronavirus caseload fell sharply in early 2021, I took a few cautious steps to reclaim bits of my pre-pandemic life. I had several outdoor lunches with friends not seen in a year. My daughter had a sleepover with her best friend, who she’d only met masked at the park since schools closed in March 2020. I planned face-to-face interviews and out-of-town stories, and felt the stirring of my old zest for life.
I wasn’t alone in hoping the worst was over in India. Many who’d confined themselves to their homes for nearly a year began stepping out as infections dropped. Winter saw a wedding boom, as couples rushed to tie the knot with family and friends in attendance. Parks were packed with picnickers. Millions flocked to the sacred Ganges river for religious rituals.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his closest lieutenants also swung into action, holding massive political rallies — with crowds as big as 700,000 people — to campaign for his Bharatiya Janata party in ongoing state assembly elections.
Now India is paying for its imprudence, reeling from an alarming second wave of Covid-19 that threatens to overwhelm a healthcare system yet to recover from a gruelling year. From around 11,000 new infections daily in February, the country recorded more than 126,265 new cases on Wednesday. The virus is spreading at ferocious speed: it took just six weeks for daily new infections to surge by a magnitude that took three months last year.
“The trajectory is very scary right now,” virologist Shahid Jameel, of Ashoka University, told me. “This kind of surge is going to be catastrophic. ” Until this week, India had few restrictions on commercial, social or public activity, and many Indians saw little cause for worry. But doctors on the front lines are now sounding the alarm. “This is going to overwhelm us in a very big, and a very bad way,” said Dr