The first part of the study conducted by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) revealed that 0.73 per cent of the population surveyed showed evidence of past exposure to SARS-CoV-2, and that urban slum population was the most vulnerable to the infection, ICMR Director General Balram Bhargava said at a press conference.
The "COVID Vaccination Amrit Mahotsav" to provide free precaution doses of the vaccines to everyone aged 18 years and above at government vaccination centres commenced on Friday.
Our government has failed the country on several counts. All this must change for India to redeem itself in six months, says Naushad Forbes.
As the election approaches, the earthquake survivors and the scientists urge political parties to take note of warning signs before it's too late.
The death toll climbed to 15,301 with 407 new fatalities, according to the Union health ministry data.
The number of recoveries also surged with 2,48,189 patients cured so far, while there were 1,78,014 active cases, according to the updated official figures at 8 am.
Modi said India has taken an important step forward in protecting its youth population against the disease.
This was the sixth consecutive day when coronavirus cases increased by more than 14,000. Consequently, India has added 92,573 cases since June 20, and over 2.82 lakh this month alone since June 1.
Harsh Vardhan said that 51 crore COVID-19 vaccine doses will be made available by July and 216 crore more between August and December.
Now, only the United States, Brazil, Russia and the United Kingdom are ahead of it. The number of active COVID-19 cases stands at 1,20,406, according to the health ministry. A total of 1,19,292 people have recovered and one patient has migrated, the ministry said.
We should be relieved that we got the doses but we must also know where they came from and who was and who was not responsible for this achievement, notes Aakar Patel.
The urgent need to address a large number of beneficiaries waiting for second dose of vaccine was stressed in a meeting held by Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan and Dr R S Sharma, the Chairman of Empowered Group on Technology and Data Management to Combat COVID-19, with state officials to review the status of COVID-19 vaccination on Tuesday.
Union health secretary Rajesh Bhushan said 50 districts account for 66 per cent of the total caseload and the COVID-19 case fatality rate has progressively declined to 2.10 per cent, the lowest since the first lockdown was imposed on March 25.
India's COVID-19 fatality rate has dropped significantly to 2.43 per cent from 3.36 per cent on June 17 due to effective clinical management of coronavirus cases, the health ministry and asserted that the country has handled the pandemic 'relatively well'.
While Covishield supplies would meet the target of 500 mn doses between August and December, it looks like Covaxin would miss the target of 400 mn unless the partner sites of Bharat Biotech ramp up very rapidly, reports Sohini Das.
'Why should our government opt for unproven technology that has been rejected by most countries across the globe?' 'Being dependent on any other nation to supply you seed for your good crops is another form of slavery.'
From 3.38 per cent in April, the fatality rate in the country has come down to 2.87 per cent as against 6.4 per cent globally.
India's reproduction value, which reflects how rapidly the coronavirus pandemic is spreading, has remained below 1 since September, suggesting that the infection rate is declining, according to a study.
For communities, inadequate shelter and overcrowding are risk factors in the transmission of diseases with epidemic potential such as COVID-19, the National Centre for Disease Control, which falls under the health ministry, said.
The Serum Institute of India has informed the Centre that it will be able to supply around 22 crore doses of Covishield in October as the Union government has announced resuming export of surplus Covid vaccines in the coming fourth quarter under the 'Vaccine Maitri' programme, official sources said.
Nepal has been hit by heavy rainfall since Thursday. More than 25 districts and 10,385 households have been affected.
The Omicron variant of COVID-19 is in the community transmission stage in India and it has also become dominant in multiple metros, where new cases have been rising exponentially, said Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium.
The development of private data sources is a hugely positive development. It should serve as a challenge to the government to improve its own record on producing timely and reliable statistics, points out T N Ninan.
Each person in the immunisation list would be linked with their Aadhaar cards to avoid duplication and to track beneficiaries.
'In the coming two-three months, we need to be cautious that there is no upsurge'
There is no change in treatment guidelines due to this mutation and the vaccines that are being developed, particularly those in the country, will not be impacted, NITI Aayog member (health) Dr V K Paul said.
India has 0.3 deaths per million population, as compared to 86 in the US, 402 in Spain, 358 in Italy and 190 in the UK, 263 in France, 45 in Germany and one in Japan.
The plans also state that highly suspected cases testing negative on Rapid Antigen Test should be examined again using the gold standard RT-PCR test.
It is necessary to have a dramatic increase in the number of rapid tests for COVID-19 conducted on a large number of people and that should become the basis for estimating the morbidity and mortality due to COVID-19, not relying only on hospital reports, says Professor K Srinivasan.
Suggesting that a relatively young Indian population may be one of the reasons for the low mortality rate due to the pandemic, experts have attributed the high number of fatalities in countries like Italy and Spain to their elderly population which are more susceptible to developing complications after contracting the infection.
'Better to prevent than to wait for evidence. Protection delayed can also mean protection denied'
In a statement Bharat Biotech clarified that the vaccine's efficacy can only be determined 14 days after the second dose.
According to officials, an additional dose of vaccine is different from a booster dose.
'The trajectory of the disease will keep increasing because of the population density being very high.'
The central government had announced that the vaccination for those above 18 years will begin across the country from May 1 as part of the third phase of the inoculation drive.
Currently, the country is using two 'made-in India' jabs -- Covishield and Covaxin -- to inoculate its billion-plus population and has administered 20 crore doses since launching the world's largest vaccination drive in mid-January. A third vaccine, Russian-made Sputnik V, has been approved by the government and is being used on a smaller scale at present.
The National Clinical Registry for COVID-19 will collect systematic data on clinical signs and symptoms, laboratory investigations, management protocols, the clinical course of COVID-19, disease spectrum and outcomes of patients.
"Vaccination is our big weapon in the fight against COVID-19," he said. He added that India is the fastest country globally to reach the landmark of 17 crore doses in 114 days and thanked all the states and UTs for their contribution in achieving this feat.
In a statement, the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said while there has been a substantial decline in the active and new COVID-19 cases, there is need to maintain surveillance, containment and caution so as to fully overcome the pandemic.
India is the seventh worst-hit nation by the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of the number of infections, after the US, Brazil, Russia, the UK, Spain and Italy. While the recovery rate in coronavirus infections is improving and has reached 48.19 per cent in India, there has been steady decline in the case fatality which is now 2.83 per cent, the health ministry said.
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