Covid testing underway in Delhi on Wednesday.Coronavirus India News Highlights: With India reporting 48,648 cases in the last 24 hours, the total number of coronavirus cases rose to 80.88 lakh on Friday. The country has been recording less than 50,000 infections for the last five days and the active cases have fallen below the six lakh mark, to a level seen in the first week of August. Also, the total number of fatalities has reached 1.21 lakh, 5,94,386 are active cases and 73,73,375 people have recovered. The national recovery rate has risen to 91.15 per cent while the case fatality rate stands at 1.50 per cent.
The Maharashtra government on Thursday extended the lockdown till November 30 without allowing any new activities in the latest order. Sources said the government may allow some activities to resume in the coming month.
Meanwhile, a day ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s two-day visit to Kevadia Colony in Narmada, where he will inaugurate several projects around the Statue of Unity, as many as two dozen police personnel tested positive for coronavirus during mandatory tests and were quarantined.
On vaccine-related news, the Supreme Court Thursday issued notice to the Centre on a plea which alleged two drugs — Remdesivir and Favipiravir — were being promoted for treatment of Covid-19 patients without clearance from regulatory authorities.
Globally, over 44 million people have been infected worldwide till now. More than one million have succumbed to the virus. The United States continues to be the worst-affected followed by India and Brazil.
Over 8 million people have been infected with Covid-19 so far.
Delhi Lt Governor Anil Baijal has approved the Delhi government's proposal to allow buses to run with full seating capacity even as COVID-19 cases are witnessing a surge in the city. The buses are currently running with 20 passengers in view of the outbreak of coronavirus. Baijal, who is the chairman of the Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA), has also approved resuming inter-state bus services and the process to plan a standard operating procedure for it is on and the service is likely to restart from next week, a senior government officer said. The number of DTC and Cluster buses seat up to 40-45 passengers. Bus stops in the city witnessed long queues as a result of reduced capacity of passengers allowed in the buses.
THe West Bengal government will employ over 17,000 doctors to monitor the treatment of coronavirus patients in home isolation following reports that some of those affected are ignoring early signs of complications and opting for medical advice only after their health condition worsened, an official said on Friday. At present there at least 97,613 COVID-19 patients in home isolation in the state, the health department official said. They are now being monitored by tele-callers employed by the state health department.
The Centre has asked states to constitute committees for coordination and overseeing COVID-19 vaccination drive while ensuring minimal disruptions in other routine healthcare services, and stressed early tracking of social media to dispel rumours which could impact the community acceptance of coronavirus inoculation.
Claire Poche, a senior official of the Oregon Health Authority, made an appearance for the daily briefing dressed as clown wearing a red tie, black polka dot shirt, bright yellow pants to complete her look.
“As of today, there have been 38,160 cases of COVID-19 in Oregon, with 390 new cases being reported today,” she said.
There are no crowds at Disneyland, still shut down by the coronavirus. Fewer fans attended the World Series this year than at any time in the past century. Big concerts are canceled.
But it’s a different story in Trumpland. Thousands of President Donald Trump’s supporters regularly cram together at campaign rallies around the country — masks optional and social distancing frowned upon.
Trump rallies are among the nation’s biggest events being held in defiance of crowd restrictions designed to stop the virus from spreading. This at a time when public health experts are advising people to think twice even about inviting many guests for Thanksgiving dinner
Scientists have designed a new face mask with an anti-viral layer to deactivate the novel coronavirus, that can make the wearer less infectious. The idea is to modify mask fabrics with anti-viral chemicals that can sanitise exhaled, escaped respiratory droplets, according to the researchers from the Northwestern University in the US. By simulating inhalation, exhalation, coughs, and sneezes in the laboratory, the researchers found that non-woven fabrics used in most masks work well to demonstrate the concept.
The study, published on Thursday in the journal Matter, found that a lint-free wipe with just 19 per cent fibre density, for example, sanitised up to 82 per cent of escaped respiratory droplets by volume. Such fabrics do not make breathing more difficult, and the on-mask chemicals did not detach during simulated inhalation experiments, the researchers said.
"Masks are perhaps the most important component of the personal protective equipment (PPE) needed to fight a pandemic," said Northwestern University's Jiaxing Huang, who led the study. "We quickly realised that a mask not only protects the person wearing it, but much more importantly, it protects others from being exposed to the droplets (and germs) released by the wearer," Huang said.
A total of 73,73,375 people have recuperated from COVID-19 so far pushing the national recovery rate to 91.15 per cent while the case fatality rate stands at 1.50 per cent. There are 5,94,386 active cases of coronavirus infection in the country as on date which comprises 7.35 per cent of the total caseload, the data stated.
India's COVID-19 tally had crossed the 20-lakh mark on August 7, 30 lakh on August 23 and 40 lakh on September 5. It went past 50 lakh on September 16, 60 lakh on September 28, 70 lakh on October 11 and crossed 80 lakh on October 29.
Japan's coronavirus cases have topped 100,000, nine months after the first case was found in mid-January, the health ministry said on Friday. The country confirmed 808 new cases on Thursday, bringing the cumulative COVID-19 cases to 100,334, including 712 people who were on a cruise ship that was docked off a Japanese port earlier this year.
About one-third of the cases come from Tokyo, where 221 cases were confirmed Thursday, bringing a prefectural total to 30,677, with 453 deaths. Nationwide, Japan has more than 1,700 deaths. Experts say Japan has so far managed to avoid "explosive" infections as in Europe and the US without enforcing lockdowns, most likely thanks to the common use of face masks and disinfectant, as well as other common preventive measures including social distancing.
The Supreme Court Thursday issued notice to the Centre on a plea which alleged two drugs — Remdesivir and Favipiravir — were being promoted for treatment of Covid-19 patients without clearance from regulatory authorities.
A bench headed by Chief Justice of India S A Bobde and comprising Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramaian issued notice with the rider that it was doing so only to make the government aware of the matter.
Petitioner Advocate M L Sharma referred to the bench a recent report of the World Health Organization (WHO) and said nowhere had the two medicines been mentioned officially as a cure for the novel coronavirus.
On Wednesday, the number of new Covid-19 cases around the world crossed 5 lakh in a day for the first time. The fresh spike in cases and deaths and growing uncertainty about controlling Covid-19 has not only brought equities back under pressure but also reinforced the case for investment in gold. If hopes of a vaccine have now spilled over to the second half of 2021, there is also anxiety over the time it may take to vaccinate the entire world population. While this is ample cause to worry investors, low interest rates and high inflation are other factors that would keep gold prices firm until a vaccine is in sight.
With the Diwali festive season round the corner, many feel the high prices should not come in the way of gold purchase, and one should continue with periodic gold investment as part of asset allocation.
Investors should look to invest in gold keeping in mind that it is a long-term generational asset, which should not be bought for short-term gains. Gold at Rs 50,000 per 10 grams may seem expensive today but may prove to be a worthwhile decision two decades later. Over the last 15 years, it has risen from levels of around Rs 7,000 per 10 grams. While future gains may not be quite what we have seen in the past, investors must invest anywhere between 5-10% of their portfolio in gold.
Two days after the Centre extended the lockdown, the Maharashtra government on Thursday extended the lockdown till November 30 without allowing any new activities in the latest order.
State Chief Secretary Sanjay Kumar on Thursday issued an order stating that “the activities already allowed and permitted from time to time shall be continued.” Kumar added that the state government was satisfied that the state is threatened with the spread of Covid-19. “Therefore, to take certain emergency measures to prevent and contain the spread of virus, the lockdown has been extended till November 30.”
With India reporting 48,648 cases in the last 24 hours, the total number of coronavirus cases rose to 80.88 lakh on Friday. The country has been recording less than 50,000 infections for the last five days and the active cases have fallen below the six lakh mark, to a level seen in the first week of August. Also, the total number of fatalities has reached 1.21 lakh, 5,94,386 are active cases and 73,73,375 people have recovered.
Union Health Ministry has said, "India has exponentially scaled up its testing capacity from one in January to more than 10.65 cr at present. The very high testing has resulted in a continuously falling positivity rate. It is 7.54% presently."
Also, a total number of 10,77,28,088 samples were tested for COVID-19 on October 29. Of these, 11,64,648 samples were tested on Thursday, according to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR.
Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday deferred the 26th edition of the Kolkata International Film Festival (KIFF) to January 8-15 in view of the Covid-19 pandemic. The marquee event celebrating actors and movies was earlier scheduled to be held between November 5-12.
“After receiving global film fraternity’s consent, I hereby inform all stakeholders of the Kolkata International Film Festival & cine lovers that our festival has been rescheduled, given the current circumstances. It will now be held from Jan 8-15, 2021. Let the preparations begin!” Banerjee tweeted.
After the announcement, KIFF said that the festival was likely to held online this year. “In view of Covid-19 pandemic, the 26th edition of Kolkata International Film Festival has been designed in a smarter frame giving due importance to social distancing. This edition is proposed primarily in online mode for the cine lovers, critics, actors and others so that they continue to feel the pulse of the gala international film festival in the cultural capital of India,” said KIFF on its website.
Two days after the Centre extended the lockdown, the Maharashtra government on Thursday extended the lockdown till November 30 without allowing any new activities in the latest order.
State Chief Secretary Sanjay Kumar on Thursday issued an order stating that “the activities already allowed and permitted from time to time shall be continued.” Kumar added that the state government was satisfied that the state is threatened with the spread of Covid-19. “Therefore, to take certain emergency measures to prevent and contain the spread of virus, the lockdown has been extended till November 30.”
Slum dwellers quarantined at SRA building in Kandivali West’s Sai Nagar threatened to leave the Covid-19 quarantine centre on Wednesday over poor quality of food and dirty drinking water.
The five-storey SRA building has been converted into a quarantine centre for slum dwellers of Kandivali and Dahisar. While it can house 400 people, currently only 94 are stationed at the centre. Each floor has five to seven families. Those quarantined Wednesday gathered on the ground floor compound demanding better food and living conditions.
“The day were arrived here, we found the centre lacking all facilities. The floor mattresses were dirty, there were no bedsheets and toothpaste. We had to arrange for everything from outside. Even now, we do not receive food on time and drinking water is visibly dirty,” said a Dahisar slum dweller, who has been living at the centre for 11 days. He said the tank where water is stored is infested with insects.
Himachal Pradesh Education Minister Govind Singh Thakur on Thursday informed that he has tested positive for the coronavirus. He is the sixth member of the state cabinet so far to have tested positive for Covid-19.
In a tweet, Thakur said that he had come in contact with a Covid patient a few days and so got himself tested along with his staff. He added that he is in good health and has is in home isolation on the advice of doctors. On Tuesday, Thakur had attended a Cabinet meeting in Shimla.
Earlier, Cabinet ministers Sukh Ram Chaudhary, Mahender Singh, Suresh Bhardwaj, Ram Lal Markanda and Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur had tested positive for Covid, but all of them have recovered. Several MLAs too had tested positive and recovered from Covid.
Meanwhile, several teachers in Sarkaghat area of Mandi have tested positive for the virus ahead of the reopening of schools from November 2.
The past week accounted for three million new cases of Covid-19 globally, the biggest increase since the start of the pandemic, with Europe once again emerging as the hotspot of the contagion. According to latest data by Johns Hopkins University, over 44.4 million cases and 1.1 million deaths have been reported globally, with 32,54,000 new infections and 43,000 deaths in the past week.
The European Region accounted for the greatest proportion of the reported new cases even as France and Germany re-imposed lockdowns in a last-ditch effort to protect hospitals from getting overwhelmed again. Europe reported more than 1.4 million new cases in the past seven days, with over 11,700 deaths, a 37 per cent jump over the previous week.
The United States is also witnessing a surge, powered by Midwest states, registering 5,21,024 infections over the past seven days, compared to nearly 370,000 the previous week. India, the second worst Covid-affected nation, has crossed the 8-million mark even though cases have dipped sharply from September’s peak. READ MORE
The Maharashtra government on Thursday announced that it has has extended the lockdown in the state till 30 November. The activities already allowed and permitted from time to time shall be continued and all earlier orders shall be aligned with this order and shall remain in force up to end of November, the state government stated in its fresh order.
The Reserve Bank of India’s study on state governments’ finances, released on Tuesday, indicates that gross fiscal deficits (GFDs) of state governments are set to double in 2020-21. With the Covid-19 pandemic having hit the financial position of states hard, the next few years are going to be challenging. READ MORE
India and the UK have clinched new partnerships to boost bilateral cooperation on combating the coronavirus pandemic as part of the 10th UK-India Economic and Financial Dialogue (EFD), held virtually following the COVID-19 lockdown and travel constraints.
A GBP 8-million joint funding initiative announced on Wednesday as part of the EFD outcomes will support collaborative research focused on understanding the severity of COVID-19 in South Asian populations in India.
The UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) and the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) in Indian Ministry of Science and Technology said their collaborative research will support research projects that are trying to understand the pandemic through the study of related ethnic groups in different environments in both countries.
"This joint programme builds on the strong foundation of India-UK research collaboration and is an opportunity to bring together our collective expertise to understand the severity of COVID-19 infection in South Asian populations of both India and the UK," said Dr Renu Swarup, Secretary of the Department of Biotechnology.
Schools and colleges will be reopen in Andhra Pradesh from November 2, the Chief Minister's Office announced on Thursday. Classes for 9, 10, 11 and 12 will commence from November 2 while classes for 6, 7 and 8 from November 23. "Classes will be held for half-day and on alternate days only, it added.
Over 40 per cent people living in Srinagar district have developed coronavirus antibodies, according to a latest sero-prevalence study. The results of the study, which was conducted by the Government Medical College Srinagar (GMC), suggest that a quantum jump from 3.8 per cent sero-prevalence recorded in a similar study conducted in the city in June. "We have conducted a sero-survey in Srinagar district which has revealed that over 40 per cent of the 2,400 persons tested negative but had developed antibodies," Dr Muhammad Salim Khan, head of community medicine at GMC Srinagar, was quoted as saying by news agency PTI.
The Supreme Court today issued a notice to the Centre on a plea which claimed that Remdesivir, Fabiparivir are being used to treat coronavirus without proper approval.
In a year marred by Covid-19, deep economic distress and uncertainty over school-reopenings, the latest Annual Status of Education Report (ASER) underlines what could be key markers of that anguish — there are more children in government schools than two years ago, and a significant number of them are not enrolled in the current academic year. The phone-based survey, done in September, the sixth month of national school closures, was released on Wednesday and shows a shift in enrollment from private to government schools — 69.55 per cent children in the 6-14 age group are enrolled in government schools, up from 66.42 per cent in 2018. Click here to read more.
The West Bengal government has asked all state-run and private medical establishments to provide details of frontline health care workers and other staff who would be administered the coronavirus vaccine on a priority basis, an official said on Thursday, PTI reported. All medical establishments like medical colleges (allopathic, homoeopathic and AYUSH), health centres, private healthcare units and polyclinics have been asked to send the list of workers, the senior official of the Health department told the news agency.
The coronavirus tally in Andaman and Nicobar Islands rose to 4,289 on Thursday after 15 more people tested positive for the infection, a health official told news agency PTI. Four new patients have travel history, while 11 infections were detected during contact tracing, the official added. Meanwhile, 20 more people have been cured of the disease, the official said.
Covid-19 patients, prescribed convalescent plasma therapy, have been facing difficulties in plasma procurement as blood banks in Mumbai have been insisting on replacement donors or extra deposits in cases where a replacement donor is not available immediately. On Tuesday, the state government issued a circular to all blood banks directing them to refrain from making replacement donor mandatory. It also asked blood banks not to charge beyond Rs 5,500 for a single unit of plasma. Though treatment of coronavirus patients through convalescent plasma therapy has dipped following questions over its efficacy, a few doctors have continued to prescribe it. Click here to read more.
Hotels across Delhi are reporting low occupancy rates — below 30% — since reopening in August as international tourist visas remain suspended and domestic tourism is yet to see a revival. On August 19, the Delhi Disaster Management Authority permitted reopening of hotels after six months of closure to help revive the economy. The hospitality sector has been hit hard by the lockdown as hotels struggle to pay EMIs and rent. As reported by The Indian Express in June, sectors dependent on tourism and hotel business such as the hotel employees, laundry services and others have also been hit due to this. Click here to read more.
The managing director of one of India’s top private diagnostic labs has said that government authorities in some districts have been trying to “control” the process of testing for the novel coronavirus in order to show a “better scorecard”. “Even though testing has been opened up, the government is still controlling private centre testing at district levels. It is happening more today than before. We have been told not to pick up samples in many districts in different states, claiming that we are reporting false positives,” A Velumani, founder and managing director of Thyrocare Technologies, told The Indian Express. Thyrocare is among the top five diagnostic centres in the country, and has been collecting samples in several high Covid-19 caseload states including Maharashtra, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Bihar, West Bengal, Jammu and Kashmir, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, and Uttarakhand. Click here to read more.
The Covid-19 tally in India zoomed past the eight million mark with 49,881 cases within a span of 24 hours. While the total caseload stood at 8,040,203, the death toll also rose to 120,527, according to data released by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. Follow this space for all the latest updates.