people dying on the streets

from lack of oxygen and packed crematoriums.

This is a snapshot of the COVID-19 crisis in India.

In contrast, just a few months ago

the prime minister declared victory against the pandemic.

(speaking in foreign language)

After that, there were political rallies.

(speaking in foreign language)

Mass gatherings and religious festivals like this one.

And then on April 21st, the country reported

a record number of COVID-19 cases in a single day.

And those numbers kept growing for several weeks.

With many health experts saying real numbers

are likely much higher.

By May 7th, deaths soared past 4,000.

As COVID cases in several Western countries

have trended lower, the scale of infection in India

and a new variant fresh reported there

have alarmed the rest of the world.

- If you have a huge country like India,

that's deep in its own COVID crisis right?

That means the pandemic is not gonna end for the world.

- [Narrator] Here's how India became

the world's COVID hotspot

and what that means for the global pandemic.

First, we have to go back to early 2020.

As much of the world was struggling to contain the virus,

India appeared to have things under relative control.

(speaking in foreign language)

Early on, Modi announced the world's largest lockdown

in the country of 1.3 billion people.

- He publicly came out multiple times

and said we have to pull it together,

we have to wear masks, we have to socially distance,

there was a lot of respect for COVID restrictions

and people were also scared.

(speaking in foreign language)

- [Narrator] The measures triggered

a mass migration of workers

trying to get back home from cities.

Epidemiologist warned that this movement

of people could help spread the virus undetected

to other parts of the country.

But the number of reported COVID-19 cases

remained relatively low, and India's apparent success

stood in contrast to some other countries including the US

which was reporting more cases than any other nation.

Some public health experts said a possible reason

for few cases in India could have been

the lack of widespread testing.

But they also noted that the majority

of the population is under 25.

And since asymptomatic cases are more common

among young people, many may have gone undetected.

After a 10 week lockdown India started to ease restrictions

and the number of cases started growing

with the first peak in September.

- [Shan] It was quite bad and the healthcare system

was stressed but the hospitals didn't crumble or buckle.

And we saw that actually in other parts of the world,

it was much worse.

- [Narrator] Despite that first surge,

by December India's numbers

had gone back down and by early 2021

life looked like it was returning to normal

- [Shan] Stores were back open, they were super packed,

restaurants were open filled with people, indoor dining,

there were cricket matches again, packed stadiums.

Life in Delhi felt like another universe.

The US was dealing with another wave,

right in December, January

- [Narrator] India was doing very well

compared to the US or the UK.

And that's when Modi talked of the country success

in front of other global leaders

at the world economic forum.

(speaking in foreign language)

So what went wrong?

Public health experts blame India's ferocious surge

on a combination of new factors.

The first one, people became more relaxed

about COVID safety measures.

Many people stopped wearing masks,

and there were several crowded gatherings

which public health experts say

may have been super spreader events

including huge political rallies.

(speaking in foreign language)

April was a key election month and political parties

including Modi's BJP party organized events

across the West Bangor state.

A BJP spokesperson said that no one had anticipated

the magnitude of the COVID-19 surge,

adding that Modi and other members of his party

followed all the safety protocols in place at the time.

Right around then, resources to fight the pandemic

weren't reinforced or maintained.

- Everyone essentially thought that COVID was over

by January hospitals were taking down their COVID-19 wards,

testing centers that had been started last year

were also being dismantled.

It's only oxygen plants

where they had allocated the budget were never built.

- [Narrator] And on top of all of this

highly contagious variants that were first identified

in the UK and South Africa were circulating in the country.

As well as a new variant known as B.1.617

that originated in India

- The 617 in India, it's a wildly opponent.

- [Narrator] The WHO has said preliminary studies

indicate that this one may be more contagious

than some other variants.

And has since been detected in more than 40 countries

including the US, UK and France.

This has added urgency to the global vaccination race,

which has so far helped cases plummet

in some of those countries.

So, even as the COVID situation has improved

in some parts of the West,

the fight against the pandemic across the globe

is far from over.

- A big lesson is just countries can't get complacent.

And even if one country is doing well

if another country is not doing well in terms of COVID

that will affect every other country in the world too.

(upbeat music)