Indian Medical Association announced on Wednesday that the South Asian lost 594 medical doctors to the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic.
The association further disclosed that the mass fatalities were recorded between April and May 2021.
The Hindustan Times reported that the national capital, Delhi, topped the list of fatalities with 107 deaths, followed by Bihar with 96 and Uttar Pradesh 67.
The IMA, being a voluntary organisation of physicians in India, stated that it is also possible that the actual number of fatalities far exceeds the recorded statistics as the association only keeps a record of its 350,000 members, out of nearly 1.2 million doctors in the country.
Reports said that India was hit hard by the deadly second wave, with daily spike of cases crossing the 400,000-mark for times, and daily deaths surpassing 4,000 on several days.
However, over the past few days, a decline in new COVID-19 cases and deaths has been observed across the country.
While bemoaning the loss of the country’s medical practitioners to the second wave of coronavirus, Dr Krati Varshney, a microbiologist at a western Uttar Pradesh-based COVID-19 care centre otherwise known as “Saraswathi Institute of Medical Sciences (SIMS)’’ noted that constant exposure to the virus must have led to the large number of fatalities among the medical community.
“They died due to constant exposure. At times it becomes very difficult to maintain all precautions during the long duty hours at COVID care centres.
“ Even with PPE kits on, sometimes one gets accidentally exposed to the deadly virus,’’ said the microbiologist who tests RT-PCR samples at SIMS.
Citing another reason, Varshney added that in most cases doctors and medical staff had common washing and changing areas, which might also have led to the transmission of virus from each another.
“In some cases, depression that crept in among the doctors during long and exhausting duty hours might have led to a reduction in overall immunity levels,’’ added Dr Krati.
