India is battling the COVID-19 crisis and world leaders, including the US, UK, Japan and neighbouring nations China and Pakistan, have offered assistance to the Narendra Modi government.

The situation in the country is alarming with over 3 lakh cases being reported everyday. The death toll has crossed 1.5 lakh tally. There is oxygen shortage in the national capital and Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has requested other states and the Centre to help him. All of this has caught the attention of global media and there were features on the first pages of newspapers across the globe this week.

Also Read| ‘It’s time to wear masks inside homes: Centre on second COVID wave

On Sunday, India broke its previous record to count more than 3.50 lakh cases. The surge has battered country’s feeble healthcare system and private hospitals have been sending SOS messages for oxygen supply. Many critical COVID patients are unable to find hospital beds, oxygen cylinders and potentially life saving medication amidst an acute shortage of medical resources in the country.

As the country witnesses an aggressive second wave, here’s how the international media has reported India’s health crisis:

Also Read| ‘Please help’: Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal asks top industrialists for oxygen, tanker

US-based The Washington Post wrote ‘As avoidable as it is tragic’. “Tens of thousands of spectators were allowed to fill stadiums for cricket matches; movie theaters were opened; and the government permitted enormous religious gatherings such as the Kumbh Mela, a festival in which millions of Hindus gathered to bathe in the river Ganges,” it said.

UK’s The Guardian published an editorial ‘PM’s overconfidence’ that stated: “The Indian prime minister’s overconfidence lies behind the country’s disastrous Covid-19 response.” Author Peter Beaumont write that the latest wave is “probably a combination of social behaviour, weaknesses in India’s health system and policy decisions.”

‘Crisis deepened by missteps, complacency’, wrote The New York Times. According to the article published in the New York Times, “Complacency and government missteps have helped turned India from a seeming success story into one of the world’s worst-hit places, experts say. And epidemiologists warn that continuing failure in India would have global implications.”

“What India needs now, epidemiologists and experts say, is concerted and consistent leadership to contain infections and buy time to make vaccinations more widely available and faster,” the NYT article stated.

An article by The Times read, ‘Modi flounders in India’s gigantic second wave’ while an opinion piece in The Guardian said, “India’s government has abandoned its citizens to face a deadly second wave alone.”