The coronavirus variant B.1.617 first identified in India last year has been classified as a "variant of global concern", with some preliminary studies showing that it spreads more easily, a senior WHO official had said on Monday.
India has one of the lowest cases per million at 1,469 as against the global average of 2,425, the government said.
The death toll due to the disease rose to 42,518 with 933 fresh fatalities being reported in a day, data updated at 8 am showed. There are 6,19,088 active cases of COVID-19, comprising 29.64 per cent of the caseload.
The Maharashtra government has decided to stop home quarantining of COVID-19 patients in 18 districts where the positivity rate is high and all active patients in these areas would be admitted to COVID Care Centers, health minister Rajesh Tope said.
You may no longer have to rely on international size charts.
In a series of tweets, the senior leader of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party also alleged that the legacy data were manipulated for including names of doubtful persons as alleged by many.
Vardhan emphasised on how the Indian traditional system of medicine has also contributed substantially in boosting the immunity of general population during COVID-19.
Men's exclusion from the reproductive debate contributes to gender inequalities, a study has revealed.
The recovery rate among COVID-19 patients has increased to 64.51 per cent.
According to the ministry's data, Maharashtra is on the top of the list with most COVID-19 cases, 5,652 cases of which 789 patients have recovered and 269 patients succumbing to coronavirus.
An overwhelming proportion of the unemployed declare their nature of occupation as students. In the quarter ended December 2021, 77% of the unemployed who were actively looking for jobs were students. This syncs well with another data, that 77% of the unemployed are between 15 and 24 years of age, reveals Mahesh Vyas.
'In the likelihood that Omicron is circulating, you have a much greater chance of getting infected now, than you did during the Age of Delta.'
Social stigma and low testing are the key reasons for the high mortality rate among COVID-19 patients in West Bengal, where the disease, like elsewhere in the country, is still an urban phenomenon, experts say. The state's Trinamool Congress government has been drawing consistent criticism from the Centre and opposition parties over the way it has tackled the pandemic, and has been accused of under-reporting data about the number of COVID-19 cases and deaths.
'All actions for COVID-19 should be the same as for other routine health conditions.' 'There is no need to report the matter in the media all the time; not on front page please.'
It took 64 days for COVID-19 cases in India to touch the (May 19) one lakh-mark from 100 cases, and another fortnight to cross two lakh cases on June 3. It took 10 days for the tally to touch the three lakh-mark and another eight days for the cases to climb to four lakh.
The Omicron variant carries 'concerning' mutations that may make it more transmissible and allow it to evade immunity, scientists said on Monday, stressing that the one certainty in the uncertainty of the many things unknown is this -- COVID is not a short-term crisis and vaccines are still a critical tool.
'Most vaccines do target the Spike protein, in which there are changes in the variants but vaccines stimulate our immune system to produce a wide range of protective antibodies'
The national average of COVID-19 tests per day per million population is 865, the ministry said, asserting that the country has demonstrated an exponential increase in the COVID-19 testing infrastructure since January 2020.
