Experts believe India's real COVID death toll exceeds one million people

India's death toll is believed by scientists to be well above the currently reported 315,000 with estimations exceeding the 1 million mark.

At least 600,000 have died

As many as 1.6 million people in India have died due to the coronavirus, according to experts. Just last week, the Asian country recorded a staggering 4,529 deathsin one single day making it the biggest 24-hour toll of any country since the beginning of the pandemic in March of 2020.

One study by the New York Timeshas found that the actual death toll number is at least double the official figure corroborating concerns of disproportionate undercounting. The same study also suggested that the most likely scenario representing an accurate number of deaths caused by the virus is of around 1.6 million, while the worst case scenario could be as high as 4.2 million fatalities.

Similarly, the US has officially recognized only 590,000 deaths in a population of 330 million leading experts to believe that there is a definite undercount at play as well.

An inevitable undercount

By comparison, India has recorded 315,000 deaths in a population of about 1.4 billion and considering the damage done by the ravaging mutation of the coronavirus, the death toll unfortunately cannot be that low. Dr Ramanan Laxminarayan, director of the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy, told the New York Times: 

As with most countries, total infections and deaths are undercounted in India. The best way to arrive at the most likely scenario would be based on triangulation of data from different sources, which would indicate roughly 500 to 600 million infections.

The experts conducting the study explained that in light of poor record-keeping and lack of widespread testing as well as the overwhelming pressure on the ability for hospitals to accept incoming patients, an undercount in the death toll was made inevitable.