India's effective reproduction number (R) for Covid, an indicator of how quickly the infection is spreading, has increased to over 1 for the first time since January, estimates a researcher from Chennai's Institute of Mathematical Sciences.
To share your Mother's Day story with us (Mother's Day will be celebrated on Sunday, May 12), just mail us at getahead@rediff.co.in (subject: Mother's Day) along with your name, the place where you live, your mother's name and picture and your message about your mom.
Intense heat swept through east India and parts of the southern peninsular region on Thursday, testing power grids and prompting the Kerala government to order closure of educational institutions till May 6.
Former World chess champion Viswanathan Anand finally returned to India on Saturday after being stuck in Germany for over three months due to the travel restrictions imposed in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. The Chennai-based chess maestro arrived by an Air India flight from Frankfurt via Delhi and reached the Kempegowda International Airport in Bengaluru around 1.15 pm local time.
So far, Delhi has seen seven positive cases including a patient who died.
Cases with the Omicron variant have already been detected in Karnataka and Gujarat.
Among the three Deputy Chief Ministers are Govind Karjol, who has also been given the charge of PWD and Social welfare; Ashwath Narayan the portfolio of Higher Education, IT & BT, Science and Technology; and Laxman Savadi with Transport department.
The affected people said they got the smell of kerosene oil in the prasad, but ignored it.
The active cases have surpassed the 12-lakh mark, while the death toll increased to 1,70,179 with 904 daily new fatalities, the highest since October 18, the data updated at 8 am showed.
In Jaipur, the combination of lopinavir and ritonavir, both second-line HIV drugs, was administered was administered on an elderly Italian couple undergoing treatment for Covid-19 at the SMS Hospital.
These states and UTs are Maharashtra (seven districts/municipalities), Telangana (four), Tamil Nadu (seven), Rajasthan (five), Assam (six), Haryana (four), Gujarat (three), Karnataka (four), Uttarakhand (three), Madhya Pradesh (five), West Bengal (three), Delhi (three), Bihar (four), Uttar Pradesh (four), and Odisha (five).
'I found it unbelievable that L&T said 45,000 jobs were waiting to be filled because of unavailability of suitable skillsets.' 'So, when the Opposition sweepingly says there are no jobs, I'm sorry... I'm not saying it's raining jobs, but there are jobs. The (skill) gap has to be bridged.'
The number of people who have recuperated from the disease surged to 1,01,62,738 pushing the national COVID-19 recovery rate to 96.53 per cent.
Athlete OP Jaisha is confident that she can start her training next week having recovered well from H1N1 fever which she contracted during the Rio Olympics even though the SAI doctor has advised her a month's rest. "After getting discharged from the hospital on August 29, I am taking rest in my native - Thrissilery village near Manananthavady in Wayanad district. I will start from training from next week," Jaisha said.
Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Telangana have announced a lockdown of educational institutions, malls and other places that attract people in large numbers, even as some of them have been reporting increase in positive cases.
While 'Ram' and 'Sita' were the preferred names for many, a baby boy born to a Muslim family in the district hospital in Firozabad, Uttar Pradesh, was named Ram Rahim by his grandmother.
A Bihar court on Tuesday ordered that an FIR be registered against Maggi brand ambassadors Amitabh Bachchan, Madhuri Dixit and Preity Zinta and arrest the cinestars.
This is the Indian Navy's first massive evacuation exercise from foreign soil during the COVID-19 lockdown.
India's total number of active COVID-19 cases has reached 1,64,511, which comprises 1.48 per cent of the country's total infections, the Union health ministry said on Sunday highlighting six states that have shown a surge in new cases in a span of 24 hours.
In a significant development, India is believed to have placed a funding request of around $55 million in its first call with the Pandemic Fund of the World Bank, sources said. The fund has been set up to finance critical investments in a bid to strengthen pandemic prevention, preparedness, and response capacities at national, regional, and global levels, with a focus on low- and middle-income countries. It was created in the aftermath of the Covid-19 global pandemic.
'The prime minister took a meeting recently and he asked for suggestions and ideas for a plan till 2047.'
Besides Karnataka, states like Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Assam, West Bengal, Arunachal Pradesh and Meghalaya have already announced area-wise lockdown for different durations.
Due to a sharp rise in Covid cases, Mumbai's civic body, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation, on Thursday imposed a weekend lockdown in the city until further orders.
The ministry, however, said it could not be sufficiently established yet if these variants were behind the recent spike in COVID-19 cases in some states.
The Centre on Wednesday deployed multi-disciplinary teams in bird flu-affected areas of Kerala and Haryana, while Madhya Pradesh, where crows have died due to the influenza, banned the entry of chicken consignments from southern states for 10 days as a precautionary measure.
Students will have an option to either attend the classes physically or online or can go in for blended learning by using both options.
With the COVID-19 positivity rate touching 0.55 percent, the Delhi government has decided to re-impose night curfew from Monday, according to sources.
Experts believe that under-reporting is likely to cause an underestimation of the spread of the disease.
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.
The Karnataka government on Saturday mandated a negative RT-PCR certificate that is not older than 72 hours for those arriving in the state by flights, buses, trains and personal transport from Maharashtra, following the recent spike in COVID cases there.
Most of those who tested positive either recently arrived from African countries or were in contact with such people.
The patient is currently admitted to the Lok Nayak Jai Prakash (LNJP) Hospital and has mild symptoms, hospital officials said.
As daily testing of samples of blood and throat and nose swabs crossed two lakh for the first time since the outbreak of the pandemic, over 14,000 new coronavirus cases were registered in the country for the fifth day in a row to take the total count to 4,56,183, according to the Union Health Ministry data.
The second phase of Covid-19 vaccination in India will begin from March ,1 in which people above 60 years of age and those above 45 years of age with comorbidities will be vaccinated, Union Minister Prakash Javadekar said on Wednesday.
Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Jammu reported one case each, officials said.
Several states and union territories, including Maharashtra, Punjab and Delhi, have announced closure of schools or suspended classes briefly till the COVID-19 situation is further reviewed in the wake of rising cases across the country.
A week after expanding his cabinet, Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa on Thursday allocated portfolios to the seven new inductees and also effected a reshuffle of the departments of some ministers.
The pandemic is set to become even more challenging, with migrant workers returning home, relaxations in lockdown rules, and the approaching monsoon. However, states are looking at community participation to ramp up testing and home treatment of patients
What worries state officials is that Bihar expects to receive more than 1 million migrant workers by the end of May.
