16 national and regional industry bodies and sectoral business lobbies video-conferenced with Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Saturday and raised key concerns facing Indian industry in the wake of the 21-day lockdown over coronavirus.
The central government is importing COVID-19 vaccines and is in talks with COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson, Union Minister of State for Home Affairs G Kishan Reddy said.
Vaccine major Bharat Biotech on Wednesday said its COVID-19 vaccine, Covaxin, has demonstrated an interim vaccine efficacy of 81 per cent in the Phase 3 clinical trials.
The spike in coronavirus deaths came on the same day the number of people hospitalised broke the 100,000-mark, according to the Covid Tracking Project.
With these states imposing lockdowns anew, the health ministry emphasised that the restrictions should be utilised to focus on containment, surveillance and testing in the containment and buffer zones as the key strategy for early detection of cases and fatality management.
The country has reported the highest number of recoveries with 42,08,431 COVID-19 patients having recovered from the disease so far, pushing the national recovery rate to nearly 80 per cent, while the case fatality rate has further dropped to 1.61 per cent, the ministry said.
The virus, which has infected more than 14,562 people, continues to spread beyond China.
Klitschko and his brother Vitali, also a former world heavyweight champion and now the mayor of Kyiv, have both taken up arms against invading Russian forces.
Paul noted that "three to four months from now, there will be other vaccines and the stockpile will be even bigger. "And more acceleration can be brought about in the vaccination programme," Paul added.
According to sources, all private offices will work from home and only government offices and essential services will be open.
States and Union Territories have been given the powers for delineation of Red, Green and Orange Zones as per COVID-19 situation, the MHA said. All shops, except those in containment zones and malls, will be allowed to open from Monday with staggered timings during lockdown 4.0, it said.
The strident support from the hotels comes at a time when the industry is itself caught off guard with a sharp dip in both in-bound traffic from foreign markets, reduced domestic traction as well as a total shut-down of MICE business that has led the country top players by market cap to lose over half their value in just a little over a month.
Jammu and Kashmir and Odisha on Tuesday recorded their first cases of the Omicron variant of COVID as the count of the new strain in 14 states and union territories crossed 200 even as the Centre said there is a need to 'activate' war rooms, take 'pro-active' action and consider night curfews.
As the virus continued to spread its tentacles across India, several parts, including Kashmir valley headed towards a virtual lockdown with the administration restricting movement of people in several parts and banning all public transport in Srinagar city.
The doctors, who are protesting against the assault on two of their colleagues at NRS Medical College and Hospital, had on Friday sought unconditional apology from Banerjee and set six conditions for the state government in order to withdraw their stir.
Over 1,200 Indian students stranded at Zaporizhzhia in Ukraine make a desperate call for help.
Asking people to sacrifice "some weeks of yours, some time of yours", Modi said given that coronavirus has no cure yet, the only way to stay safe is to stay indoors.
Chandrayaan-II hard-landed on lunar surface last year. The Indian Space Research Organisation had then resolved to launch the project again. It had said the project is likely to be launched by the end of the year.
The Paytm employee, who tested positive for the contagious disease with flu like symptoms on Wednesday, came in touch with 91 people in Gurgaon, an official said, citing his counterpart in the suburban town.
Safety and Efficacy results from the final analysis will be available in June, and the final report will be submitted to a peer-reviewed publication.
Resident Doctors' Association of the AIIMS in Delhi, which earlier decided not to join the strike, announced withdrawal of all non-essential services from noon after a junior doctor at its trauma centre was assaulted in the early hours of Monday.
A record number of 2,129 of Americans died in one single day, the previous highest being 2,074 on April 10. New York has become the epicentre of the country's outbreak with 2,03,020 confirmed cases and 10,842 deaths so far.
Prohibition of all types of gatherings, reduced size of weddings and funerals, running of public transport at half seating capacity and scaled down presence in government offices were some of the restrictions imposed by the Delhi government on Saturday amid a surge in COVID-19 cases.
In this weekly self-help series, mental health and life coach Anu Krishna tells you how to take control of your life.
In this weekly self-help series, mental health and life coach Anu Krishna tells you how to take control of your life.
About 18-19 coronavirus vaccine candidates are in different clinical trial stages and may be available in the coming months, Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said on Monday.
Most of those who tested positive either recently arrived from African countries or were in contact with such people.
The guidelines said that keeping in view the recent spike in new cases in a few states and UTs, ongoing festival season and onset of winter, it is emphasised that to fully overcome the pandemic there is a need to maintain caution and to strictly follow the prescribed containment strategy.
The plea has sought the apex court directions to the authorities to open the roads at Delhi borders, shift these protestors to allotted place and provide guidelines on social distancing and use of mask at the protest place to contain spread of COVID-19 cases.
An estimated 1.5 lakh people are being shifted from low-lying coastal areas in Gujarat while 54 teams of the NDRF and SDRF remained deployed on Sunday in view of the India Meteorological Department's (IMD) warning that the very severe cyclonic storm Tauktae will reach the state coast on Monday evening and cross it on early Tuesday morning.
'All the vaccines that are available in most countries, right now, are all highly effective and safe.'
The Gudi Padwa processions are cancelled. Police are also maintaining a tight bandobast to prevent people from crowding the markets.
'The BJP would like to capitalise on Yogi's tough image on criminals, law and order situation, and hands-on CM.' 'Modi will be an additional advantage, but it is primarily a contest between Yogi and Akhilesh.'
'This means that there is a higher likelihood of individuals who have recovered from COVID-19 to be reinfected with the Omicron variant'
A control room has also been set up and the Strategic Health Operations Centre (SHOC) of the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has been activated, phone number for which is 011-23978046, a health ministry statement stated.
Maharashtra government has deployed ambulances available with the state emergency medical service at the city's international airport to shift suspected Ebola Virus Disease passengers.
Action against the foreign Tablighi Jamaat members were taken after over 2,300 activists, including 250 foreigners of the Islamic organisation were found to be living at its headquarters located at Delhi's Nizamuddin despite the 21-day lockdown imposed to check the spread of coronavirus.
Japan is still preparing to host the Olympics, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Saturday, despite rising global concern about the viability of the summer Games due to the coronavirus outbreak. He said Japan has a relatively low infection rate and has not seen an explosion in cases as seen in South Korea, China, Italy, Iran and elsewhere. He said delaying the peak of infections is vital to ensure treatment of those in critical condition.
'Now is the time for politicians to stop thinking of their own interests, for companies to stop making money out of vaccines, and become one country fighting the virus.'
As the Indian Army reported its first case of the infection with a 34-year-old soldier testing positive in Leh, the Army said it has taken a series of precautionary measures to prevent the spread of coronavirus among the forces such as checking flu symptoms among soldiers on their return from leave and cancelling non-essential travel, conferences and recruitment drives.
