India (MNN) — India set record highs for new COVID-19 cases, and the world is responding to its call for help. Planes carrying aid from 40 countries have arrived in the past week, but supplies remain stuck in customs.
Meanwhile, new infections passed 20 million yesterday, nearly doubling the pace set in March. Furthermore, “a lot of people aren’t getting to the [test sites],” John Pudaite of Bibles For The World says.
“The real number [of new cases] could be two to three, even five times as high.”
Hospitals are petitioning the Delhi High Court for oxygen supplies. Questions surround the government’s ability to handle a crisis of this magnitude.
Prime Minister Modi (Photo courtesy of Speaker John Boehner via Flickr: https://flic.kr/p/pciUVL)
“In the early days… one of his (Prime Minister Modi’s) ways to address the [pandemic] was to have everyone go outside at a certain time of the evening, bang on pots and pans and chant, ‘go corona; corona, go,’” Pudaite says.
“Some of the Hindu religious leaders were recommending bathing in cow urine and smearing themselves with cow dung; these were supposed to be effective protection against the coronavirus.”
Pudaite hopes disillusionment will lead to governmental change and relief for India’s persecuted Christian minority. “All of this adds up to a very fertile time for the Gospel to spread in India. The people of India are seeing their current leaders, the pro-Hindu forces, have led them astray,” he says.
“Pray that this might be the end of BJP rule in India over the people.”
Bibles For The World operates a small hospital in northeast India, offering medical care in Christ’s name. More about that here.
“We are starting to see a small spike in cases; it’s a lot smaller than what we see in other parts of India,” Pudaite says. Support Bibles For The World’s medical ministry here.
“First and foremost, we need to pray. The Body of Christ is losing a lot of faithful workers,” Pudaite says.
“Over the weekend, I got another list of 25 pastors who have either died of COVID or are in serious condition, and this just keeps mounting.”
Header image courtesy of Govind Krishnan via Unsplash.
