Addressing a press conference on measures taken during 21-days lockdown imposed from March 25 to contain the spread of Covid-19, MHA joint secretary Punya Salila Srivastva said the situation of essential goods and services is under control. To strengthen this situation, the home ministry has written to state governments that both inter-state and intra-state movement of trucks and goods carriers should be allowed during the 21-day countrywide lockdown announced by the central government irrespective of the cargo being essential or non-essential.
The Tamil Nadu government has been transparent in reporting COVID-19 deaths and no one can hide the information, Chief Minister K Palaniswami said on Thursday, rejecting claims of under-reporting of fatalities. He also asserted there was no community transmission of coronavirus in the state, which has reported 1,500 plus fresh cases for four successive days till Wednesday with the tally crossing the 36,000 mark.
ICMR's serological survey, whose findings will be made public next week, suggests that the rate of contagion may be a lot higher in most-affected cities such as Delhi, Mumbai, and Pune.
CA will talk to the IPL franchise owners on this arrangement but conceded that it will not be a simple thing.
The ICMR said people having symptoms like fever, cough, sore throat and runny nose and residing in hotspots or cluster areas and in evacuee centres will now be tested for coronavirus infection.
Report by Greenpeace also presented a grim picture of India's pollution level.
The green body's report said three of the world's largest nitrogen oxide air pollution emission hotspots that contribute to formation of PM2.5 and ozone are in India with one in the Delhi-NCR.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern on Thursday announced that New Zealand will temporarily suspend the entry for all travellers, including its citizens, from India for about two weeks from April 11 due to a surge in COVID-19 cases among visitors to this country.
The Delhi Police has launched action against alleged 'fake posts' on social media platforms related to the violence that broke out on Republic Day during the farmers' tractor protest and has registered four cases in the matter, officials said on Wednesday.
'A balanced head plus heart approach would be a full opening up of the economy including manufacturing and internal travel in the country but excluding COVID-19 hotspots,' recommends Jaimini Bhagwati.
According to the scientists, including Edwin Chong from Colorado State University in the United States, the novel technique can help identify the most crowded areas such as a city centre, where asymptomatic carriers have a high probability of coming into close contact with large numbers of healthy people.
Perhaps it says something more deep and profound about the time we live in and how it has shaped us, observes Aakar Patel.
The IPL has been postponed till April 15 in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic and with the country scheduled to go for another two week extension of the lockdown, it is but natural that the cash-rich league can't be held during its dedicated April-May window.
Addressing a daily media briefing to give updates on the COVID-19 situation in the country, Joint Secretary in the Health Ministry Lav Agarwal said most of the Markaz event-related cases have been found in states with high burden of the disease, such as Tamil Nadu (84 per cent), Telengana (79 per cent), Delhi (63 per cent), Uttar Pradesh (59 per cent) and Andhra Pradesh (61 per cent).
'Mr Kejriwal has played it cool in distancing himself from Delhi's hotspots, adroitly pandering to the BJP's Hindu vote.' 'He neither visited the scene of JNU violence nor has he dropped by at Shaheen Bagh,' notes Sunil Sethi.
"Both the number of new patients and that of deaths are highest for a single day so far," an official said. 79 persons tested positive for COVID-19 during the day, taking the number of such cases in the country's financial capital to 775, the civic body said.
There are a number of trial sites across both Mumbai and Pune that we have shortlisted, as these cities have many hotspots, which will help us understand the efficacy of the vaccine, the company's chief executive Adar Poonawalla said.
'Those who were not co-operating are co-operating now.' 'Now, our facilities are fit, our doctors are fit and we have a better protocol of how to do isolation, how to do the collection.'
Gadgil and the report prepared by the Western Ghats Ecology Expert Panel (WGEEP) headed by him are back in news after over two dozen people lost their lives in landslides and flash floods in the past few days in the hilly regions of Western Ghats in central Kerala districts of Kottayam and Idukki.
A glimpse at what happened around the world last week.
With the world's worst outbreak of COVID pandemic stalling a nascent economic recovery, the government has begun assessing the impact of the second wave of infections on different sectors and may look at providing support at an appropriate time to segments requiring fiscal help. Some of the economic indicators, including the Goods and Services Tax (GST) collections, still provide confidence and incoming data will throw some more light on the state of the economy, sources said. Services sectors like hospitality, tourism and aviation which had just started recovering were hit hard by the second wave of COVID, the sources said, adding these segments might need some support on an urgent basis from the government.
Even if someone did something wrong, do not consider everyone guilty. Some people want to misuse it, the RSS chief said in an apparent reference to incidents involving Tablighi Jamaat members after it centre in Delhi emerged as a major coronavirus hotspot.
The ICMR-NICED authorities said it could be possibly because the kits "have not been standardized"
Government sources said the GoM on coronavirus crisis also reviewed various measures being initiated by concerned ministries to allow partial economic activity in 'non-hotspot zones' from April 20.
The study revealed South Asia and Southern Africa as the two hunger hotspots where climate impacts on agriculture look particularly dire.
The stimulus package is expected anytime this week and will be aimed at the urban and rural poor; disadvantaged sections of society; MSMEs and some of the worst-affected sectors.
The world's biggest malls belong to Asia with two of the toppers from China.
The famous Nokia 8110 comes back to life in a new avatar after 22 years!
The Renault Duster is available as a two-wheel drive model only, with a few interesting engine options.
The death toll in the US due to coronavirus on Sunday crossed 9,500, which is three times more than the number of people who died in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
The callousness with which these political dissidents are being treated goes against the Supreme Court's directive, given right at the beginning of the lockdown. The apex court had directed states to release prisoners to decongest jails, which had become hotspots of the coronavirus.
In the past one week alone, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, and Andhra Pradesh have issued orders to take over private hospitals in some districts. Sohini Das, Vinay Umarji and Gireesh Babu report.
'...but having to bring a number of teams and getting them to isolate to prepare and then move around the country to different venues, I think that will be a logistical nightmare.'
'If Trump is out, Modi is going to find himself in a hotspot, having to reset his relations with the new US President with whom he will have to co-exist for well-nigh his full term,' notes B S Raghavan, the distinguished civil servant.
The government of Maharashtra decided to shut operations at APMC Vashi mandi between May 11 and 17 after confirmed cases of Covid-19 surpassed 80 in the APMC and over 450 across Navi Mumbai, where the mandi is located.
The outcome ratio of COVID-19 -- the ratio of recoveries and deaths of closed cases -- was recorded at 90:20.
India is currently home to 52 unicorn startups and one of the fastest-growing startup ecosystems.
With multiple health camps at these protest sites, immediate medical assistance is always at the farmers' disposal in case a protestor develops symptoms like fever or breathlessness.
Behind the state's success in containing coronavirus positive cases is one novel initiative -- Active Case Finding or ACF, which even Prime Minister Narendra Modi endorsed for the bigger states to follow. The ACF campaign began in April with 16,000 basic health personnel, ASHA, anganwadi workers and auxiliary nurse midwives (ANM) out on foot trekking to most mountain valleys, snow-bound districts and remote passes of the state, reports Ashwani Sharma.
