12 2GM Thursday August 6 2020 | the times
News
India’s coronavirus infections are to
reach more than two million this week
as new figures indicate the true scale of
the outbreak is far greater than official
numbers suggest.
The country recorded more than
50,000 new cases for the seventh day in
a row yesterday, carrying the total case-
load beyond 1.9 million. Another 857
deaths brought the national toll to
39,795.
The United States and Brazil have
higher total caseloads but India has
emerged in recent days as the country
with the fastest-growing infection rate
in the world. The Bloomberg Corona-
virus Tracker said last week that infec-
tions had risen by 20 per cent in a week.
India passed a million cases on July 17.
Two recent studies have suggested
that the true tally is far higher. A survey
of slum dwellers in Mumbai published
last week reported that more than half
had been infected by the virus. Blood
tests by the city’s officials on almost
Chemists in Japan were stripped of a
gargling solution by panic buyers yes-
terday after a regional governor sug-
gested it could help to fight coronavi-
rus.
Hundreds of thousands of people
posted pictures on Twitter of empty
shelves, accompanied by notices that
said “Out of Stock”, as they asked where
stocks of Isojin, a povidone-iodine anti-
septic, could be found.
Hirofumi Yoshimura, the governor
of Osaka, said a study showed there was
a smaller viral load in the saliva of 41
patients with mild symptoms after reg-
ular gargling with a medicine infused
with povidone-iodine.
“Perhaps we can even overcome the
coronavirus with gargling medicine,”
he told a news conference. The studyBuyers strip
shelves of
gargle ‘cure’
Foreign StaffWuhan patients still
have lung damage
three months later
term effects of the virus. Research has
found that the after-effects of serious
infections include brain impairment,
strokes, seizures and organ damage.
A similar study, by Liang Tengxiao,
deputy chief physician at the
Dongzhimen Hospital in Beijing, found
that many of his patients over 65 who
had recovered from severe disease still
required oxygen support. Many had
not regained their sense of smell or
taste, a recognised a symptom of
infection.
The Beijing research said that some
patients remained in the general ward
of the hospital as they recovered. One
of them could manage without supple-
mentary oxygen for only ten minutes.
The report said that Dr Liang’s
patients were retested for coronavirus:
5 per cent returned positive results in
one of two standard tests and had to be
quarantined again.
Doctors in the West have been
reporting a variety of illnesses long
after the infection even among patients
who only had mild symptoms. Patients
have suffered fatigue, shortness of
breath, joint pain and damage to the
heart, lungs, kidneys, and brain.
According to one study conducted in
Italy, 87 per cent of people treated in
hospital for Covid infection were still
struggling two months later. Data
based on apps used by people to record
their symptoms show that 10 to 15 per
cent of them take months to recover.
A World Health Organisation team
who are in China to investigate the
origins of Covid-19 have had “extensive
discussions” and exchanges with scien-
tists in Wuhan, a spokesman said.
The talks included updates on
animal health research, he added.
China shut down a wildlife market in
Wuhan at the start of the outbreak, a
day after discovering that some
patients were vendors or dealers.
The WHO says that the virus
probably came from bats and had
another intermediary animal “host”.Didi Tang Beijing
Patients at Zhongnan Hospital in
Wuhan took part in the studyThe vast majority of Covid-19 patients
treated in intensive care in Wuhan, the
source of the coronavirus pandemic,
are still experiencing debilitating lung
damage three months after their dis-
charge, a study has found, raising fears
over long-term effects.
The research by Peng Zhiyong, the
intensive care director at Zhongnan
Hospital of Wuhan University, record-
ed that patients lacked energy and
found it difficult to walk long distances.
Nearly half had developed symptoms
of depression, felt that they were stig-
matised by society and could not return
to a normal life.
A similar study in Beijing found that
several patients older than 65 who had
needed critical care were still on sup-
plementary oxygen. Many had not
recovered their sense of smell or taste.
Dr Peng’s research, conducted last
month, is part of a year-long study
tracking 107 patients with an average
age of 59, who suffered viral pneumonia
and were intubated during the crisis. At
the three-month mark, Dr Peng found
that 90 per cent still had lung damage,
including to ventilation and gas ex-
change functions.
Tests to compare patient strength
against a healthy group found that
those who could walk covered an
average of 400m in six minutes, com-
pared with the 500m expected of an
average person.
Physical fitness was only one of
several problems the patients still faced,
the study reported. Dr Peng said that
the immune systems of most patients
were still compromised. About one in
ten had lost the antibody needed to
fend off attacks of the virus.
“The results revealed that the
patients’ immune systems are still
recovering,” Dr Peng told the media.
He also found that fewer than half
the 100 people had returned to their
jobs. Up to half were depressed and
exhibited a sense of shame about their
ordeal.
His team used two measurements to
gauge depression: one showed that a
fifth of the group was in a state of de-
pression and the other indicated that
half the group was clinically depressed.
Nearly all of those visited by Dr
Peng’s team reported that even family
members did not want to dine with
them at home, let alone outsiders. The
state-run Global Times newspaper
reported that many of the patients’
families had refused to allow follow-up
questions. This was a clear sign that
they wanted to forget about their
relatives’ ordeals, the researchers
added.
Wuhan recorded its first official case
in December and spent two months in
strict lockdown. The city and surround-
ing Hubei province suffered 4,
deaths from an official caseload of
almost 70,000 but the disease had
largely subsided by April.
Given the city’s early role as the
centre of the pandemic, Dr Peng’s study
is one of the earliest indicators of long-Fear over India’s huge hidden infection rate
7,000 randomly selected people found
that 57 per cent of slum dwellers had
coronavirus antibodies.
About 40 per cent of the 20 million
people in Mumbai live in slums. The
city was India’s hardest hit in the early
days of the crisis and has reported some
120,000 infections.
The appearance of Covid-19 last
April spread terror through the sprawl-
ing region of Dharavi, one of the largest
slums in Asia, where a million people
live crammed into an area spanning
less than a square mile. Case numbers
and deaths did not explode as feared,
however.
The local officials were praised by the
World Health Organisation last month
for their “aggressive action” fighting the
virus in an area with poor sanitation
and where social distancing was all but
impossible.
The recent survey suggested that
asymptomatic cases were “likely to be a
high proportion of all infections”.
Another recent study in Delhi sug-
gested that almost a quarter of the capi-tal’s 29 million people might have had
the disease. A random sample of 20,
Delhi residents found that 23.4 per cent
had coronavirus antibodies. Most had
no idea they had contracted the virus.
If those results were replicated, it
would equate to almost 6.8 million in-
fections in Delhi alone, far exceeding
the 4.6 million cases in the US, officially
the worst-hit country.
From the outset India’s
testing regime has raised
speculation that the
scale of the outbreak
might never be
known. The system
has been improved
since the early
days of the pan-
demic, when only
five people per mil-
lion were tested.
The health minis-
try said yesterday thatmore than 15,000 people per million
were being tested, a figure that still lags
far behind other world powers.
Indian officials have tried to reassure
the nation, pointing to a steadily falling
mortality rate of just over 2 per cent.
That is calculated as a proportion of
total cases, however, again suggesting
the true figure is higher since most
people die without medical
attention.
Several Indian states
and local officials
have been accused
of covering up
their infection
rates and death
tolls to save face,
refusing to test
hospital patients
or the dead, even
on coronavirus
wards. Most Indians
die at home, suggest-
ing that the majority of
India’s deaths from Covid-
19 have gone unreported.Hugh Tomlinson
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touring the Mumbai slumsNews Coronavirus