India is currently battling not only the lethal second wave of COVID-19 but also shortages of oxygen, medicines and hospital beds. But, a segment of people has been feeding off the tragedy. There are reports of profit-seekers charging exorbitant rates for ambulances, drugs etc. India currently tops the daily infection tally with 314,835 cases and 2,104 deaths reported in the past 24 hours.

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In a case reported by news agency AFP, Pranay Punj of Patna, Bihar, ran from one pharmacy to another in a frantic search for the antiviral medication Remdesivir for his seriously ill mother. He finally located a pharmacist who offered to source it for Rs 100,000, over 30 times its usual price and three times the average monthly salary for an Indian white-collar worker, the agency reports. Remdesivir is ordinarily sold between Rs 2,500 and Rs 4,500 in Indian markets, with price variation depending on the manufacturer.

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Punj finally got the medicine from a distant relative whose wife had just died from the virus. But that was not the end of his travails, hours after he had delivered the medicine, Punj got another call informing him that the hospital had now exhausted its oxygen stock. Then began another frantic search for a hospital bed.

“Several hours later, we managed to procure one bed at (a) very high price in a private hospital and moved her there,” he told AFP.

Such incidents are unfolding all over the country, with people posting desperate pleas for plasma, hospital beds or medication. Almost every other message, originating from India, on social media platforms are desperate pleas for help.

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In Uttar Pradesh‘s Lucknow, Ahmed Abbas was charged Rs 45,000 for a 46-litre oxygen cylinder, nine times its normal price. “They asked me to pay in advance and pick it (up) from them the next day,” the 34-year-old told the agency.

On Wednesday India’s top doctors — AIIMS director Randeep Guleria, Narayana Health Chairman Dr Devi Shetty and Medanta Chairman Dr Naresh Trehan — held an FB interaction urging people not to panic. They said that around 80% of patients can be monitored and treated at home.

Amid growing panic in the country, Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the nation saying that “all efforts are being made” to boost supplies of oxygen and medicines. According to reports, the government is now planning to import 50,000 tonnes of oxygen and has set up a special train service called the “Oxygen Express” to transport cylinders to hard-hit states.

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“One solution to this crisis was to create a stockpile of antiviral drugs when cases were low, but that did not happen,” said Raman Gaikwad, an infectious diseases specialist at Sahyadri Hospital in the western city of Pune, reports AFP.

Instead, Remdesivir manufacturers told the Indian Express this week that government officials had ordered them to cease production in January because of a fall in infections.