In India the situation seems out of control.
The coronavirus mutant B.1.617 is mainly held responsible for the deadly Covid crisis.
International aid is now arriving.
Update from April 27th, 9.30 a.m
.: In India the situation is dramatic. The new coronavirus mutation B.1.617 is spreading inexorably. Ventilators are in short supply and oxygen is in short supply. Hospitals are overcrowded and patients have to be turned away. For the sixth day in a row, India reports more than 300,000 new infections and more than 2,700 deaths. According to experts, the actual numbers are likely to be much higher. The crematoria are completely overloaded. Photos of corpses being cremated in parking lots in front of a crematorium shake.
First aid deliveries from Great Britain arrived in India on Tuesday.
A Lufthansa plane landed in New Delhi with a hundred ventilators and 95 oxygen concentrators on board, as the Foreign Ministry announced in New Delhi.
Ministry spokesman Arindam Bagchi published photos of the aircraft unloading in the online service Twitter and wrote: "International cooperation at work".
Britain plans to provide more than 600 vital medical devices.
A total of nine aircraft container loads are planned with almost 500 oxygen concentrators, 120 devices for non-invasive ventilation and 20 devices for manual ventilation, as announced by the British Commission in New Delhi.
International cooperation at work!
Appreciate the shipment of vital medical supplies from 🇬🇧 including 100 ventilators & 95 oxygen concentrators that arrived early this morning.
pic.twitter.com/MBZFwSn4cH
- Arindam Bagchi (@MEAIndia) April 27, 2021
For fear of introducing the corona mutation B.1.617, Germany and numerous other countries have largely imposed an entry ban.
How dangerous is the Indian corona double mutant?
Deaths hit a sad record
Update from April 26th, 10:40 a.m.:
The concern about coronavirus mutations does not stop.
For days, India has repeatedly recorded high levels of new infections.
On Monday, India reported another global high with 352,991 corona cases.
2,812 deaths were recorded within 24 hours - more than ever since the beginning of the pandemic.
However, the unreported numbers are likely to be significantly higher in the country.
The new virus mutant B.1.167 is believed to be partly responsible for the devastating situation in the emerging market.
Corona mutant in India: mass burns of Covid-19 dead
India's health system threatens to collapse under the corona burden.
The skyrocketing number of cases has led to a shortage of drugs and medical oxygen.
Patients are queuing in front of the hospitals.
Relatives of corona patients are desperately looking for free hospital beds on the Internet.
On Saturday (April 24th) terrible pictures from New Delhi went around the world.
The crematorium site has been converted for the mass cremation of Covid-19 dead.
People prepared stakes.
+
Several fires were lit in New Delhi to burn Covid-19 dead.
© Altaf Qadri / dpa
Concern in Europe: Entry stop for returnees from India
Occasional cases of the Indian mutation were also detected in Great Britain, Germany, Belgium and Switzerland
(see first report)
.
In addition to Germany, Italy has also decided on an extensive entry ban for people who have previously been in India.
"It was right that we acted quickly to stop the entry of the new mutation into Germany," emphasized Foreign Minister Heiko Maas (SPD) to the
Rheinische Post
.
As
reported by
oe24.de
, Austria is also considering
stopping
entry to India for returnees.
“Within the federal government and in discussions with companies, we are currently pulling out all the stops to be able
to provide support as quickly as possible, for example with oxygen and medication,” Maas continued.
Great Britain and the USA have also already sent aid deliveries.
The first nine air freight containers from Great Britain are to arrive in India on Tuesday night, as British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced.
Among other things, ventilators and oxygen concentrators are supplied.
The US government promised, among other things, raw materials for vaccine production and ventilators.
France and Canada have also offered help.
Our first report from April 25th: Concern about Indian double mutants - now first case discovered in Switzerland
Geneva - In India, a corona variant dominates the infection process: B.1.617.
The situation on the subcontinent is devastating.
The corona variant was first found in the Indian state of Maharashtra and is spreading rapidly there, as the Robert Koch Institute * (RKI) announced in its current report on virus variants of Sars-CoV2 in Germany.
B.1.617 therefore also circulates in other Indian states.
In Great Britain and also in Germany isolated cases have been found.
B. 1.617: Indian corona mutation now also in Switzerland
Now there is the first corona case with the mutation B.1.617 in Switzerland: As the Swiss Federal Office of Public Health (BAG) reports via Twitter, the mutation was detected in a traveler.
The passenger traveled to Switzerland via a European airport.
Initially there was confusion about the origin of the person.
In the meantime, the authority made it clear that the passenger had flown to Switzerland via a transit airport.
The first case was proven at the end of March, according to
20min.ch.
The BAG is now looking into putting India on the quarantine list.
According to the RKI, 21 corona cases with the Indian variant B.1.617 have been detected in Germany so far, in Great Britain initially 77.
Is the Indian corona mutation B.1.617 dangerous?
The Indian corona mutation B.1.617 has so far been under observation in Germany, reports the RKI. It therefore only belongs to the so-called "Variants of Interest" VOI for short. In contrast to others, such as the British corona mutation B.1.117 *. This is one of the so-called worrying Corona variants - VOC (Variants of Concern). According to the WHO, a variant is considered "worrying" if it is known that, among other things, it spreads more easily, causes more serious diseases and bypasses the immune system.
The Indian corona mutation is also known as the "double variant" because there are two special mutations in the so-called spike protein. It is believed that one of these mutations undermines the antibody response somewhat, so that antibodies are not as good at preventing the virus from entering the cell. On the other hand, there is also evidence that the immune system does not react to the virus with T cells as expected.
The new Corona double mutant in India is not the only cause of the extremely high number of infections there, explained RKI Vice Lars Schaade at a press conference on the Corona situation in Berlin on Friday.
Also, whether it is an immune escape variant has not yet been conclusively clarified.
There is no lockdown in India and major events are taking place, explained Schaade.
The mutation is under observation, but he does not yet classify it as "worrying".
+
Indian corona mutation: first case detected in Switzerland (symbol photo).
© Andreas Haas / imago
India will be on the list of virus variant areas in Germany from Monday (April 26).
Then there is an extensive entry ban for people who have previously stayed in India - people with German citizenship or German main residence are excluded.
But you have to be in a 14-day quarantine.
(ml) * Merkur.de is an offer from IPPEN.MEDIA
List of rubric lists: © Money Sharma / afp