The United Kingdom announced Wednesday to send three oxygen production units to India, after a first shipment over the weekend of medical equipment to this country devastated by the Covid-19 epidemic.

But he has no extra vaccines to provide.

The three units, each the size of a sea container, can produce 500 liters of oxygen per minute, the British government said in a statement.

"We are alongside our Indian friends in their fight against Covid-19," said Foreign Minister Dominic Raab, for whom "international collaboration is more essential than ever".

"This additional British aid will make it possible to meet India's current needs, in particular for oxygen," he detailed.

An explosion of the worrying epidemic

A first shipment of oxygen concentrators and respirators from the UK arrived in India on Tuesday, and a second batch of the same type is expected to arrive on Friday.

A total of 495 oxygen concentrators and 200 respirators will be delivered by London, the former colonial power.

Contacted by AFP, the Foreign Ministry has not yet specified when the oxygen production units will arrive.

India is seeing its health system crumble under the flood of patients, who face a lack of hospital beds, oxygen reserves and life-saving medicines.

The explosion of cases is attributed in particular to a new variant and to large-scale political and religious gatherings.

The coronavirus death toll there exceeded 200,000 there on Wednesday, with more than 3,000 deaths reported in 24 hours for the first time, according to official data.

AstraZeneca doses soon?

The United States has announced that it is sending overseas - and possibly to India - 60 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, developed by the United Kingdom.

London, however, is not in a position "for the moment" to offer India excess doses, Health Minister Matt Hancock said at a press conference on Wednesday.

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