Why India’s mortality rate is so low?

The corona pandemic hit the world very hard along with India. Over 11 million cases have been reported and more than 150 thousand people died in this country. Even the mortality rate due to COVID-19 has been lower compared to other countries of the world. The reason is beyond explanation.

The US leads the world with more than 20 million cases and over 500 thousand deaths. According to the Johns Hopkins University & Medicine, Coronavirus Resource Center, the observed case-fatality ratio is very low (1.4%) among the 20 countries. According to their report, the number of deaths per 1,00,000 population is only 11.58 (lowest) among the 20 countries.

The mortality is shown in the most affected countries:

Why coronavirus has become less devastating in India so far?

Before the arrival of the 2nd wave of COVID-19 in India, let us try to analyze the reasons. The assessment of Epidemiologists and scientists went wrong so far as India experienced a low mortality rate from the Novel Coronavirus despite the crowded conditions in urban life.

Let me try to explain some of the points that might affect the mortality rate in India.

Effect of BCG Vaccine:

(BCG) vaccine (full name — Bacillus Calmette-Guerin) is generally used for those countries where Tuberculosis and Leprosy occur frequently. BCG vaccine was being introduced in the year 1920. At that time, India was the country that had the highest number of Tuberculosis patients in the world. So, a mass immunization was ordered in 1948 in India.

A section of scientists has observed a lower death rate in people in some countries who have been vaccinated with BCG at a certain time in their lives. They compared BCG vaccination policies of the different countries and their respective death rates.

There might be a positive correlation between the two things — vaccination policy with BCG vaccine adopted by India and more protection was being provided to the people. The death rate of the nations covered with a BCG vaccination program was 4.28/million whereas the rate in those countries without BCG vaccination program was 40/million. So, one of the many reasons maybe is that the BCG vaccine became helpful to protect the body of many Indians from acute respiratory infections caused by the COVID-19 virus. India’s mortality rate might be reflected by one of these reasons.

Under-reporting of Covid-19 cases and deaths:

Several epidemiologists have the opinion that India’s low mortality rate has been reflected due to under-reporting. At the same time, the number of cases was also low due to under-reporting. It is a logical point on behalf of the scientists that initially the state governments of various states in India could not maintain the report of COVID-19 cases properly. Many cases remained unreported.

Originally published at https://www.bigumbrella.co.in on March 1, 2021.