Dead Bodies Floating in Ganges River, Officials Can't Confirm if They Died of COVID-19

In Eastern India's Ganges River, several dead bodies were found floating, and while the country is combating a surge in COVID-19 cases, officials cannot confirm if those people died of the disease.

The cause of death has yet to be determined

According to authorities on Tuesday, they have yet to determine the cause of death. Bihar state officials stated that health officials were working through the evening on Monday in retrieving 71 bodies.

Social media photos of the bodies floating in the river gave rise to outrage and speculation that they were the bodies of COVID-19 victims. Authorities performed autopsies on Tuesday but remarked they have yet to confirm the cause of death due to decomposition.

More corpses were discovered floating in the river on Tuesday. They were washing up in the Ghazipur district in the nearby Uttar Pradesh state. Police and villagers were present at the location, around 50 kilometers (30 miles) from Monday's incident, reported AP.

Their condition reportedly suggests they might have been floating in the river for many days. According to Ashok Kumar, a local official, there is a probability these bodies have originated from Uttar Pradesh, reported BBC.

According to a local official, Mangla Prasad Singh, they are making efforts to discover where the dead bodies originated and how they got in the river. One resident of Ghazipur, who uses one name, Surinder, said villagers did not have adequate wood to cremate the dead bodies.

Ghazipur remarked, "Due to the shortage of wood, the dead are being buried in the water. Bodies from around 12 to 13 villages have been buried in the water," reported Los Angeles Times.

Uttar Pradesh and Bihar are going through increasing novel coronavirus cases as infections in India increase faster than any other nation in the globe. On Tuesday, India confirmed almost 390,000 new cases, including 3,876 more fatalities.

Kumar said the remains would be cremated or buried. According to officials, the bodies seemed to be bloated and partly burnt. He added they might have ended up in the river partially because of cremating coronavirus victims along the Ganges river in Uttar Pradesh.

It has reportedly been found in the sprawling Indian capital that a simple shortage of oxygen is killing numerous people infected with COVID-19. For days, desperate family members lined up to refill oxygen tanks. However, with shortages that have taken a fatal toll for persisting weeks, numerous leave empty-handed.

According to Chandra Mohan, a resident, private hospitals are looting people because common people are not left with funds to pay a priest. They also spend more money on cremation at the river bank.

The Ganges is revered as sacred by Hindus. The cremated bodies' ashes are usually scattered in its waters.

Overall, India had the second-highest number of confirmed COVID-19 cases, following the United States with almost 23 million and more than 240,000 deaths. All of the figures are nearly certainly a vast undercount, according to experts.