Her appointment as World Health Organisation's deputy director offers an opportunity to push for improving the medical research environment in India.
There is mounting evidence that suggests that Omicron subvariants -BA.4 and BA.5 - are infecting people who have been vaccinated.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said India will never compromise the interests of its farmers, fishermen and dairy farmers, asserting that he would be ready to pay any price.
Emulates mentor Visvanathan Anand, who had won the tournament back in 1986.
Four cities in neighbouring Pakistan and one in China are among the world's top 20 polluted cities.
Eminent cardiac surgeon Dr K M Cherian, who performed the country's first coronary artery bypass surgery about 50 years ago, has passed away. The veteran surgeon, in his 80s, died in Bengaluru on Saturday after reportedly collapsing during a function. Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin have expressed their condolences, recognizing Dr Cherian's contributions to cardiology. Dr Cherian, who founded the Frontier Lifeline hospital in Chennai, was a recipient of the Padma Shri award.
MS had written that seeds of the green revolution were first sown in the fields of CRRI through the indica-japonica rice crosses, and decided that the plant type should be tailored to be functionally responsive to external application of fertilisers.
The curtailed squad that is now travelling to the Mexican capital include Rakshitta Ravi, Bommini Mounika Akshaya and Amulya Guruprasad among girls while Harshavardhan GB, Pranav Anand, Dushyant Sharma and
Renowned agricultural scientist M S Swaminathan and the driving force behind the nation's 'Green Revolution,' passed away in Chennai on Thursday.
She further said that the religious dress codes should not be imposed on players.
The India 'A' and 'B' teams registered comprehensive seventh round victories
With the Indian teams doing well so far, they can run into one another in the competition.
It has bolstered the home team's medal chances at the 14-day event, which is expected to see massive participation from more than 150 countries.
"As I was working on agriculture, my family wanted me to take over the management of our plantations. But my aim was to master the art of developing new varieties, that is genetics and breeding. As the proverb has it, we reap what we sow. Consequently, sowing the right things is very important," M S Swaminathan had once said.
India 'B' blanked Estonia 4-0 in the second round of the Open section in the 44th Chess Olympiad in Mamallapuram, Chennai, on Saturday while the second-seeded India 'A' team defeated Moldova 3.5-0.5 to make it two wins from as many matches.
Chess player Soumya Swaminathan has been left a bit shaken by the storm triggered by her pullout from a tournament in Iran over the issue of compulsory headscarf but remains firm in her belief that religious diktats should not extend beyond places of worship.
"Even though the vaccine may not be able to provide absolute protection against different variants of virus, it can certainly reduce the risk of death and complications," a statement quoting WHO chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan said.
"As of now, there is no data from any country to suggest these new subvariants are more clinically severe," Chief scientist at WHO clarified.
Soumya Swaminathan called on governments to boost exercises on reporting actual numbers.
A technical advisory group of the World Health Organisation was on Tuesday reviewing data on Covaxin for the emergency use listing of India's indigenously-made vaccine and it could pronounce its decision within the next 24 hours or so, a spokesperson said.
Koneru Humpy effortlessly defeated Denise Frick of South Africa while D Harika outplayed compatriot Soumya Swaminathan to move to the second round of the women's World Chess Championship, in Khanty Mansiysk, Russia.
The Indian teams made winning starts in the Open and women's sections of the 44th Chess Olympiad in Chennai on Friday.
Grandmaster Abhijeet Gupta won a silver by pocketing seven points out of nine games while Tania Sachdev turned out to be the best woman performer for India with a bronze medal in the Chess Olympiad, that concluded in Istanbul Turkey on Sunday.
Having done all the hard work with spectacular results, Indian players would look to hold their nerves in the final dash to finish at the podium in the World Women Chess Team Championships, in Mardin, Turkey.
The Indian eves came up with a spectacular performance to crush Armenia 3.5-0.5 in the fourth round and take the sole second spot in the World Team Chess Championship Mardin, Turkey.
India scored an emphatic 4-0 victory over South Africa and jumped to joint second spot after the third round of the World Women's Team Chess Championship in Mardin, Turkey.
The Indian eves could not keep the momentum and lost to Georgia 1-3 in the eighth and penultimate round of World women team chess championship in Mardin, Turkey.
The Indian eves failed at the first major hurdle as they went down 1-3 to Russia in the sixth round of the world women team chess championship in Mardin, Turkey.
India will be fielding three teams each in the Open and women's sections respectively.
Five-time champion and World No 3 Grandmaster Viswanathan Anand will spearhead a five-man strong Indian challenge at the prestigious Corus Chess Tournament starting in Wijk Aan Zee, The Netherlands, on Monday.
The World Health Organisation's technical advisory group will meet on October 26 to consider the Emergency Use Listing (EUL) of Covaxin, a vaccine developed by Hyderabad-based Bharat Biotech protecting against COVID-19, the global health agency's chief scientist said.
The global health agency also emphasized that it must evaluate a vaccine thoroughly to make sure it is "safe and effective".
Woman Grandmaster Bhakti Kulkarni and Grandmaster S P Sethuraman made history, winning the gold medal in the Asian Continental Women's and Open chess championship that concluded in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, on Friday.
The results reported from the observational studies, on average, show that vaccination had 95 per cent efficacy against severe disease both from the Delta variant and from the Alpha variant, and over 80 per cent efficacy at protecting against any infection from these variants.
A new sub-lineage BA.2.75 of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus has been detected in countries like India and the World Health Organisation is following this, Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
A summary of sports events and persons who made news on Thursday
Speaking on the National Technology Day, Swaminathan said, "I would like to commend and congratulate the minister and colleagues for having contained so far the COVID pandemic in India and having kept both the number of cases and the number of deaths very low compared to other countries."
As India launches the world's most ambitious and biggest vaccination drive against COVID-19, the country will encounter the formidable challenge of rapidly scaling up distribution of the vaccines to secure immunity for its entire population, two prominent Indian scientists at World Health Organisation have said.
There is a process to be followed for EUL and pre-qualification of vaccines under which a company has to complete phase 3 trials and submit the whole data to the regulatory department of WHO which is examined by an expert advisory group," Swaminathan said.
Dronavalli Harika and Koneru Humpy came up with fine individual performances to win a silver and a bronze, respectively.
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