May 08, 2022

India denies the deaths of millions of COVID victims

topic:	Health and Sanitation
located:	India
editor:	Tish Sanghera

As the brutal second wave of the novel coronavirus hit India in early 2021, hospitals were choked with demands for beds and oxygen tanks while families scrambled to buy medicines to ease their relatives’ suffering.

An acute humanitarian crisis was clearly unfolding during the hot summer months of April and May 2021. In Delhi, residents struggled to secure slots in the city’s clogged cremation grounds and in Uttar Pradesh, bodies hurriedly wrapped in cloth were sent floating down the Ganges as the time, space and family members required to carry out traditional funeral rites were unavailable. Though the scale of the devastation has been immense, with every family feeling they have been affected, India’s official COVID-19 death toll stood at close to just half a million (480,000) by the end of 2021. 

This week the World Health Organisation (WHO) released a new report on the updated COVID-19 global death toll. There were 14.9 million excess deaths associated with COVID-19 globally in 2021, according to the WHO. Of these, almost a third or 4.7 million were in India - nearly ten times the government’s figure.

The disparity between the WHO’s figures and the government’s is not surprising considering that under-counting deaths is a historical issue in India due to poor infrastructure. In rural areas, for example, or among more marginalised populations, some deaths simply never make it onto the record. Analysts have also decried the Indian government’s overly strict definition of a COVID-19 death, leading to severe undercounting, whereas the WHO’s estimates include those who died of COVID-19 both directly and indirectly, such as those who could not access medical treatment because of the pandemic. 

During the second wave, the vast mismatch in officially-reported figures and the ground reality of overloaded crematoriums and mass funerals led journalists and researchers to begin gathering their own data from municipal-level registries and witnessed huge spikes. A study published in the journal Science placed the COVID-19 death toll at 3 million, after surveying 140,000 people and asking if there had been a death in the household. Another study by a team, which included one of India’s former Chief Economic Advisors, Arvind Subramanian, placed its estimate between 3 and 4.9 million.

The Indian government has rejected the WHO’s methodology for calculating COVID-19 deaths using mathematical models and attempted to stall the release of the global data. The significant increase in the COVID-19 death toll counters the government’s triumphalist narrative on its response to the pandemic and follows its egregious statements, like its claims that no deaths occurred during the second wave due to a lack of oxygen. 

Will we ever know India’s true COVID-19 death toll? Unlikely. Does it matter? Yes, particularly in terms of providing validation and closure to those who lost loved ones. It is especially important for learning lessons and improving preparedness for the next pandemic or health emergency.

Photo by Mufid Majnun 

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