The reason is that because of the hybrid immunity after three waves of natural infection and a large proportion of adults receiving both doses of COVID-19 vaccine, the susceptible pool has come down drastically, Lahariya said.
Domestic air passenger traffic plunged around 43 per cent month-on-month at 64 lakh in January 2022 as the third wave of the pandemic and the resultant restrictions by state governments kept flyers away from air travel, Icra said on Tuesday. The domestic passenger volume in December 2021 was recorded at 112 lakh. The rating agency said it is expecting the recovery process to remain subdued during March quarter and that the jet fuel prices continue to be a drag on the sector. The passenger traffic declined 17 per cent last month over 77 lakh passengers transported by domestic airlines on local routes in January 2021, Icra said.
All COVID vaccines do not prevent infection and are primarily disease-modifying, said Dr Balram Bhargava, director general, Indian Council of Medical Research on Thursday.
The UK's National Health Service was already lining up thousands of medics and volunteers to be ready to deliver jabs up and down the country.
India has covered enough population with vaccine and infection, but protein vaccines should remain available on payment basis for elderly and those with comorbidities.
According to CoWIN data, only 73 vaccination centres are currently active in India, of which 32 are government-run.
Adar Poonawalla says it took a five-minute chat with his father Cyrus before making the decision to manufacture Covishield. The bet paid off, and handsomely. Serum Institute now has the capacity to make 4 billion doses of Covishield annually.
The spike in the country's financial capital has got pronounced since December 20, when just 283 cases were reported. Tuesday had witnessed 1,377 cases in the metropolis, and Wednesday's figure was a jump by over 80 per cent, he pointed out.
BCCI treasurer Arun Dhumal on Tuesday said India's tour of South Africa remains on schedule provided the situation doesn't aggravate in the rainbow nation after a new COVID-19 variant was detected there.
China's top respiratory disease expert Zhong Nanshan warned of a small COVID-19 spike in the winter and reminded the elderly and vulnerable populations to get vaccinated as soon as possible, state-run Global Times reported.
Addressing a press briefing, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said healthcare workers and frontline workers need not register themselves as their database has been populated on to the Co-WIN vaccine delivery management system in a bulk manner.
South Africa confirm updated India itinerary.
Around 70,000 people are expected to watch the match from the venue on the first day.
The health minister said that experts had identified over 1,000 cases with the variant, predominantly in the south of England.
While Karnataka reported five new cases, Delhi and Telangana reported four each, and Gujarat reported one fresh case of the Omicron variant.
In the wake of the surge in respiratory diseases and new JN.1 sub-variant of COVID-19, the World Health Organisation (WHO) said that the virus is evolving and changing and urged the member states to continue with strong surveillance and sequence sharing.
It urged Guinea's authorities to immediately reconsider the decision.
Over time, as more mutations occur, the vaccine may need to be altered.
'Seek medical help if after five days of the first symptom the fever has not subsided.'
The COVID-19 virus got mutated 223 times in the world and its harmful effects have come down substantially over time, Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya said in Lok Sabha on Friday.
Most of those who tested positive either recently arrived from African countries or were in contact with such people.
The novel coronavirus has mutated before, and both companies say they've found that their vaccines worked against other variations of the virus.
Pakistan on Monday banned travel from 15 countries, except under certain conditions, and tightened up travel restrictions on 13 other countries in wake of the threat of the new COVID-19 variant Omicorn.
The ICMR-National Institute of Virology has been regularly undertaking studies to understand the protective efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines against emerging variants.
'The worst is possibly over because too many of us may already be infected.'
Amid a gradual rise in daily Covid-19 cases, the Union health ministry said on Thursday that the XBB.1.16 subvariant of Omicron might be the dominant virus strain in the country but there has been no reported increase in the rate of hospitalisation or death so far.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday stressed the need to ensure adequate health infrastructure at the district level and asked officials to maintain coordination regarding this with the states, in view of the prevailing COVID-19 situation.
... 'Or any country which has reasonable vaccine coverage.' 'The emergence of Omicron clearly proves that if we allow a virus to circulate in an unvaccinated population, it would take a form which could be a Variant of Concern, or a new variant.'
The UK's health authorities have confirmed that a new and "most significant" variant of COVID-19 is officially under investigation in the country as the government on Friday added six countries to its travel ban red list from southern Africa, where B.1.1.529 strain was first identified.
A case of COVID-19 sub-variant JN. 1 has been detected in Kerala as part of an ongoing routine surveillance activity of the Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium (INSACOG), a senior official from the Indian Council of Medical research (ICMR) said on Saturday.
In order to prevent the spread of the Omicron variant of coronavirus, the West Bengal government on Thursday announced that it has suspended all the flights coming to Kolkata airport from the United Kingdom from January 3 onwards till further notice.
'If we take such an approach, we may find ourselves in a tough situation.' 'COVID-19 doesn't spread through water or air or mosquito; it only spreads from person to person.' 'We should make wearing a mask as part of our life.'
The metropolis saw an upward trend in daily COVID-19 cases in the second week of October.
In a letter to states and UTs, Union Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said such an exercise will enable timely detection of newer variants, if any, circulating in the country and will facilitate undertaking of requisite public health measures.
The objective of the study was to determine the genetic diversity among Indian SARS-CoV-2 viral isolates in comparison to the strains that are occurring worldwide.
'We have set out our 2021 calendar and look forward to the return of F1 in March this year.'
The patients were being administered paracetamol, and not Remdesivir drug, which was used for patients in the first and second COVID-19 waves, they said.
The Oxford vaccine, which also has a tie-up with the Serum Institute of India, is expected to win approval in the UK before Thursday, speeding up the provision of the jab to the most vulnerable groups.
An immune-escape Covid-19 strain coupled with the natural spike in influenza and pneumonia cases during winters may lead to a rise in hospitalisation.
As of Thursday, he said total deaths in America due to COVID-19 is over 527,000. That's more deaths than in World War I, World War II, the Vietnam War, and 9/11 combined, he said.
