More than a wave, many are now describing India’s current Covid-19 condition as a wall that the country appears to have slammed into. The e...

More than a wave, many are now describing India’s current Covid-19 condition as a wall that the country appears to have slammed into. The enormous rise in case counts over the last month is barely believable, though it is playing out daily for patients and families across the country struggling to find hospital beds, oxygen cylinders, life-saving drugs and even space at a crematorium.
There is only so much a limited healthcare system can do when faced with a challenge this large, with politicians, bureaucrats and medical professionals now scrambling to get the situation under control. But nearly every one agrees that in the medium term, there is only one answer: vaccinations.
India began its vaccination campaign in January, and managed to scale up at a remarkable pace over March and early April, achieving daily numbers above that of much richer entities like the United States of America and the European Union.
Unfortunately, even as the Covid-19 case count has risen precipitously through the month of April, the number of vaccines the country has administered has been falling.
The trend shows up even on the government’s CoWin dashboard, reflecting a fall in doses administered after a peak in the first week of April. Incidentally,...