US President Trump has issued emergency declarations for 10 states as authorities continue to prepare for frigid cold which will sweep across the eastern two-thirds of the country.
Cyclone Ditwah is moving towards the Tamil Nadu coast, bringing the threat of heavy rainfall. The state government is reviewing preparedness measures, and a red alert has been issued for southern and delta districts.
Companies with "gas guzzlers" are trying to set up the wrong narrative against small cars getting relaxation in the proposed corporate average fuel efficiency (CAFE-III) norms on the basis of weight, Maruti Suzuki senior executive officer corporate affairs Rahul Bharti said on Monday, bringing to the fore deep division among carmakers regarding the upcoming rules.
The Delta variant is more transmissible than the viruses that cause MERS, SARS, Ebola, the common cold, the seasonal flu and smallpox, and it is as contagious as chickenpox, according to the document, a copy of which was also obtained by The New York Times.
AY.12, a sub-lineage of Delta which is driving fresh cases in Israel, is being seen in many states in the country but the numbers need a closer examination, INSACOG, a genome sequencing consortium, has said in its latest bulletin.
In view of cases of the Delta plus variant of COVID-19 emerging in Maharashtra, the state government on Friday announced 'state-level trigger' for imposing restrictions in administrative units irrespective of weekly positivity rate and oxygen bed occupancy percentage.
In the ensemble trial, Johnson & Johnson's vaccine was 85 per cent effective against severe/critical disease and demonstrated protection against hospitalisation and death. The vaccine was consistently effective across all regions studied globally, including in South Africa and Brazil, where there was a high prevalence of rapidly emerging Beta and Zeta variants during the study period.
While virologists say theoretically the vaccine that works on Delta should work on the Delta Plus variant as well, more research is needed.
The international team of researchers combined lab-based experiments and epidemiology of vaccine breakthrough infections, showing that the Delta variant is better at replicating and spreading than other commonly-observed variants.
As of July 13, at least 111 countries, territories and areas have reported detection of the Delta variant, and this is expected to continue to increase, becoming the dominant variant globally in the coming months.
Whether it's navigating the labyrinthine Cu Chi Tunnels, boating on the Mekong, marveling at ancient Champa temples, or the Mekong Bay, Vietnam promises a journey like no other.
While Delta wiped out the variants that preceded it, Omicron has not eliminated the deadly variant which could re-emerge.
Experts in Singapore, which is seeing a surge in Omicron cases, have warned that the new and supposedly more contagious variant is likely to replace Delta over the coming weeks as the dominant global variant, with the virus being fitter and having a reproductive advantage.
Omicron is a 'deviant' from the COVID-19 pandemic progression script and so it must be postulated that two pandemics are going on side by side, one by the Delta and close relatives and the other by the latest variant of concern, said noted virologist Dr T Jacob John.
'Delta continues to be the dominant lineage for new cases across all parts of India in recent samples and remains the most rapidly rising lineage globally that is responsible for multiple outbreaks, including across Southeast Asia, which shows the fastest growth in new cases globally,' the INSACOG said.
Vaccines Covishield and Covaxin work against SARS-CoV-2 variants Alpha, Beta, Gamma and Delta, while effectiveness tests against the Delta Plus variant is ongoing, the government said.
The Delta plus variant of COVID-19 has greater affinity to lung tissues as compared to other strains but it does not mean that it will cause severe disease or is more transmissible, head of coronavirus working group National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (NTAGI) Dr N K Arora said.
The rapid surge in cases during Delhi's fourth COVID-19 wave was mainly driven by the Delta variant, which likely has immune-evasion properties and counted for 60 per cent of the cases in April, according to a new study.
'Seek medical help if after five days of the first symptom the fever has not subsided.'
However, the "good news" is that the US vaccines are effective against the Delta variant, said Fauci, the head of the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
The highly transmissible Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 has mutated further to form the 'Delta plus' or 'AY.1' variant but there is no immediate cause for concern in India as its incidence in the country is still low, scientists in New Delhi said.
The minister said he was not supposed to say anything officially as he was still in touch with the union health ministry and the ICMR officials.
22 cases of the Delta Plus variant of the coronavirus have been detected in India, with 16 of them being reported from Maharashtra and the remaining from Madhya Pradesh and Kerala, the government said.
Omicron has started replacing Delta variant in the country in terms of the number of COVID-19 cases and positive international travellers are almost 80 per cent Omicron now, official sources said on Friday.
China has reported a spike in COVID-19 infections in Zhejiang Province which registered 138 locally-transmitted confirmed cases stated to be that of new Delta strain "sub-lineage AY.4", prompting authorities to bar millions of people in the eastern province from travelling.
Over the medium and long term, the BJP hopes to devour the AIADMK, they having identified the party as 'ideologically not as sound as the DMK', predicts N Sathiya Moorthy.
The highly virulent 'Delta plus' variant of the novel coronavirus could stoke a third wave in Maharashtra, according to a presentation made at a meeting attended by Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray.
In its weekly report on the pandemic, the World Health Organisation said on Tuesday that the incidence of COVID-19 has increased globally, initially driven predominantly by transmission of the Delta variant, particularly in the European region.
'Scientifically the effect and change of Delta plus has to be watched through our INSACOG system. This has to be detected and we have to see its presence in the country'
'This means that there is a higher likelihood of individuals who have recovered from COVID-19 to be reinfected with the Omicron variant'
The city, which reported the first case of COVID-19 in late 2019, has also upgraded its epidemic response measure, locking down the area where local COVID-19 infections have been reported while upgrading its risk levels, Chinese state media Global Times reported.
The WHO's move came nearly three weeks after India objected to the B.1.617 mutant of the novel coronavirus being termed an 'Indian Variant' in media reports with the Union Health Ministry pointing out that the UN's top health organ has not used the word 'Indian' for this strain in its document.
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The new order will impact cities like Nagpur, Thane and Pune as they had seen more relaxations than Mumbai, which continued to be under 'level 3' restrictions, despite qualifying for 'level 1' where all curbs are allowed to be lifted.
The Reproduction number or Rt refers to how many people an infected person infects on average. In other words, it can tell how efficiently a virus is spreading.
The yet-to-be peer-reviewed findings, recently posted on the preprint repository BioRxiv, show that the BA.2 sub variant may have features that make it as capable of causing serious illness as older coronavirus variants.
The situation inside the "bubble" stood in sharp contrast to outside, with a surge in infections fuelled by the Delta variant hitting daily records and for the first time crossing 5,000 in the host city, threatening to overwhelm Tokyo's hospitals.
Core to the planning is the rigidly-enforced closed loop that physically separates Games-related personnel from the local population
Diesel price on Friday was hiked by 20 paise per litre - the first increase in rates in over two months - as international oil prices neared their highest since 2018. Price of diesel was hiked to Rs 88.82 per litre in Delhi and to Rs 96.41 in Mumbai, according to a price notification of state-owned fuel retailers. Petrol price was not changed. It costs Rs 101.19 a litre in Delhi and Rs 107.26 in Mumbai.
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