Coronavirus India LIVE Updates: Tally rises to 473\,105; more than 400 deaths recorded in 24 hours
Coronavirus India LIVE Updates: Tally rises to 473,105; more than 400 deaths recorded in 24 hours
Coronavirus (Covid-19) Tracker, India Lockdown News Live Updates: More than 400 deaths were also recorded, taking the total to 14,894. As of now, Delhi continues to remain the city with the highest case count — 70,390 cases so far.
By: Express Web Desk | New Delhi |
Updated: June 25, 2020 10:11:46 am
The Shenai Banquet opposite LNJP hospital in Delhi has been turned into an isolation facility and will start operations from Thursday. (Express photo/Tashi Tobgyal)
Coronavirus India News Live Updates: The Covid-19 tally in India rose to 473,105 on Thursday after nearly 17,000 fresh cases were recorded within a span of 24 hours. More than 400 deaths were also recorded, taking the total to 14,894. As of now, Delhi continues to remain the city with the highest case count — 70,390 cases so far.
Meanwhile, India is gearing up to install AI-based ‘Covid surveillance’ cameras that detect body temperatures of individuals and whether a person is wearing a mask. First off the block is Indian Railways, which has called for tenders to purchase the systems for railway stations and other places expected to see significant footfall, with a few railway zones having already concluded the purchase, such as in Mumbai.
Globally, over 9.4 million people are infected with the virus with as many as 482,162 deaths. The United States continues to be the worst affected country followed by Brazil, Russia and India.
Live Blog
Coronavirus (Covid-19) Tracker, India Lockdown News Live Updates: Nearly 17,000 cases in last 24 hours; Delhi worst city; Over 9.4 million infected worldwide. Follow LIVE updates here
10:11 (IST)25 Jun 2020
Hetero Labs Ltd prices generic version of remdesivir at Rs 5,400 per vial
India’s Hetero Labs Ltd has priced its generic version of remdesivir, Gilead’s experimental Covid-19 drug, at 5,400 rupees ($71) per 100-milligram vial, the drugmaker said on Wednesday, as it prepares to ship them to hospitals in the country. The privately held company said it would supply 20,000 vials of the drug. Fellow Indian drug firm Cipla Ltd had said on Tuesday that its own version of the antiviral drug remdesivir would be priced below 5,000 rupees. Cipla and Hetero are among a bevy of drugmakers which have licensing agreements with U.S.-based Gilead Sciences Inc, the original manufacturer of remdesivir, to make and sell the drug in 127 low- and middle-income countries.
10:08 (IST)25 Jun 2020
Bengal hospitals warned of strict action if non-Covid patients denied admission
In a bid to regulate admission of non-Covid patients in the hospitals, the Health Department has warned both private and government hospitals that strict action will be taken if patients were denied admission for treatment. The government also cautioned private hospitals of suspending licences as well as initiating necessary penal steps if it receives any complaints of patients being denied admission for treatment. “There have been instances of denial of admission and services by the private hospitals and patients suffer due to this lackadaisical attitude of these hospitals. Such denial is an offence under the West Bengal Clinical Establishments (Registration, Regulation and Transparency) Act, 2017 and the West Bengal Clinical Establishment Rules, 2017. If any report of denial of admission or services is received against such private hospital, necessary penal steps, including suspension of licence, will be initiated against the aforesaid hospital,” the order issued by the Health Department said.
09:52 (IST)25 Jun 2020
Ramdev Ayurvedic ‘corona kit’: no govt nod, trials that used allopathic drugs
A day after Ramdev launched an ayurvedic ‘Corona Kit’ claiming it cured Covid-19, serious questions have emerged over the business practices of Patanjali Ayurved Ltd, the FMCG company that markets Patanjali brand products and Divya Pharmacy, the unit producing the medicines. On Wednesday, a day after the Ministry of Ayush ordered Patanjali to stop publicising claims of Covid-19 cure, the Uttarakhand government said its licencing authority did not grant any approval to the Corona Kit, and the Rajasthan government told The Indian Express it had no knowledge of clinical trials at National Institute of Medical Sciences and Research (NIMS), a private hospital in Jaipur where Covid-19 patients are admitted. Most significantly, when mildly symptomatic patients developed fever during the trials, they were administered allopathic medicines. As it is, the trials were conducted only on asymptomatic and mildly symptomatic patients. Severely symptomatic patients and those with acute respiratory distress syndrome were excluded for enrolment.
09:46 (IST)25 Jun 2020
Rs 150,000 crore plus: The govt stimulus for rural areas post lockdown
There are many parallels one can draw between the novel coronavirus-induced lockdown (gharbandi) and demonetisation (notebandi), in terms of their impact on India’s farm economy. Both resulted in the same thing – demand destruction – albeit through different routes. Either way, the outcome was the same. Notebandi and gharbandi both basically “flattened” farm produce prices, by shifting the demand curves to the left. The demand drop wasn’t due to prices going up. Rather, with consumption being limited to homes — manpower shortages forced many food companies to also curtail production in factories and, hence, cut raw material purchases — there was less demand now for milk, potatoes or tomatoes even at the same price. This wasn’t, in other words, simply a “movement along the demand curve”, but a “leftward shift in the demand curve”.
09:25 (IST)25 Jun 2020
2,07,871 samples tested for Covid-19 in 24 hours: ICMR
As many as 75,60,782 samples have been tested so far.
Delhi now city with most covid cases: Cases surge but testing, beds up too
At first glance, the numbers tell a scary story — of Delhi surpassing Mumbai to become the city with the highest Covid-19 cases in the country. And the fact that a third of the capital’s 70,390 cases have been recorded in the past week. A closer look at the capital’s evolving Covid response, though, suggests that the surge in cases is closely tied to significantly increased testing — 1.08 lakh tests, more than a fourth of the total, have been conducted in the corresponding period. So far, the city has tested over 4.2 lakh people using the RT-PCR as well as rapid antigen testing kits. The number of hospital beds has also increased in the past two weeks — from 8,800 on June 10 to 13,400 on Tuesday.
09:18 (IST)25 Jun 2020
Covid-19 tally rises to 473,105 in India
The Covid-19 tally in India rose to 473,105 on Thursday after nearly 17,000 fresh cases were recorded within a span of 24 hours.
08:28 (IST)25 Jun 2020
IIT-Bombay scraps face-to-face lectures till year-end
The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Mumbai has become the first major educational institution in the country to scrap all face-to-face lectures for the rest of the year due to the pandemic. In an announcement made late Wednesday night, director Subhasis Chaudhuri said the institute would teach the next semester “purely in the online mode so that there is no compromise on the safety and well being of the students”. “The COVID Pandemic has made us at IIT Bombay rethink the way we impart education to our students. To ensure that our students begin the academic year without further delay, we are planning on extensive online classes details of which will be informed to all students in due course of time,” he wrote in a Facebook post shared close to midnight.
07:05 (IST)25 Jun 2020
Now past Mumbai too at Covid top, Delhi to survey all houses, ramp up testing
With 3,788 new Covid-19 cases being reported on Tuesday, Delhi has overtaken Mumbai as the city with the highest case count — 70,390 cases so far. The total case count in Mumbai, which reported 1,118 new cases in the last 24 hours, is 69,528. While Delhi has done 4.2 lakh tests so far (about 22,142 per million), Mumbai 2.94 lakh tests (22,668 per million). Mumbai’s positivity rate (23.2%) remains higher than Delhi (16.7%); Delhi also has fewer deaths (2,365) than Mumbai (3,964). With the number of cases still rising, the Delhi government has prepared an ambitious plan —house-to-house screening in containment zones by June 30, and in the rest of the city by July 6.
06:51 (IST)25 Jun 2020
Assam begins mental health programme to help Covid-19 patients, those in quarantine
The Assam government has started a mental health support programme for Covid patients and quarantined persons in the state to provide emotional support, counselling and treatment. The programme, called ‘Monon’, was started on June 17. The team behind it comprises 220 psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, psychiatric social workers, and trained voluntary counsellors. It is led by Dr Mythili Hazarika, an Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology at Gauhati Medical College and Hospital. “This is a unique kind of a programme, where the mental health professionals are calling those who might need help rather than just waiting for them to call us,” Hazarika told The Indian Express. She added that each person on the team is allotted to call at least 15 Covid patients per day.
02:20 (IST)25 Jun 2020
With a bus, a counter and minimal staff, South Delhi begins aggressive testing
Around 2.30 pm Wednesday, more than 30 people stood in a queue outside a CRPF bus at Sarvodaya Enclave's gate number 2, some visibly anxious as the line slowly moved forward. The bus is a makeshift laboratory aimed at providing free and fast Covid test results to area residents, with officials saying such mobile testing labs have become crucial in assessing the spread of the virus.
"For the past several days, we have been carrying out mobile tests in many parts of South Delhi. Testing trucks are stationed at vantage points as well as in and around containment zones. We have observed that in many areas, several domestic helps, shopkeepers and people whose jobs involve visiting multiple places reside. In such a case, testing becomes crucial since the data gives an idea of where the infection is spreading. We also carry out surveys to ensure testing vans are placed in such a manner to provide maximum coverage," said Kapil Chaudhary, South Delhi sub-divisional magistrate.
The makeshift testing centre involves a bus where the testing kit is placed and a registration counter outside. A lab technician handles the testing paraphernalia, while another makes reports. A driver and two CRPF guards are also present. A government doctor oversees the operations. The resident welfare associations of these areas help the SDM arrange the mobile testing facility.
01:57 (IST)25 Jun 2020
BMC: Now, those over 70 years can undergo Covid testing without prescription
Bringing yet another change in its testing protocol, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) will now allow all those over the age of 70 to undergo testing for Covid-19 without prescription. The BMC, which had earlier warned doctors of disciplinary action if they recommended tests to patients without physical examination, has now decided to review this rule as well stating that e-prescriptions will also be allowed for testing. Read more here
01:06 (IST)25 Jun 2020
Pune: In one month, 700 pc jump in Covid cases in Pimpri-Chinchwad
The number of persons infected with coronavirus disease (Covid-19) in Pimpri-Chinchwad crossed 2,000 on Tuesday, as was predicted by the civic administration at the start of the month.
"At the civic general body meeting held earlier in the month, I had predicted that Covid-19 cases will rise to between 2,000 and 3,000. In the next few days, we expect the number of cases to touch the 3,000 mark," Municipal Commissioner Shravan Hardikar told The Indian Express. Read more here
00:56 (IST)25 Jun 2020
Assam begins mental health programme to help Covid-19 patients, those in quarantine
The Assam government has started a mental health support programme for Covid patients and quarantined persons in the state to provide emotional support, counselling and treatment. The programme, called ‘Monon’, was started on June 17. The team behind it comprises 220 psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, psychiatric social workers, and trained voluntary counsellors. It is led by Dr Mythili Hazarika, an Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology at Gauhati Medical College and Hospital.
In the first six days, the ‘Monon’ team made a total of 2,543 calls to under-treatment Covid patients or those who have recovered. Out of this, 1,212 persons needed counselling. According to official figures, out of the 1,200-odd people who needed counselling, 94 were found to be depressed, 139 with symptoms of clinical anxiety and at least nine people suffered suicidal tendencies. But of the diagnosed people, 43 had psychiatric symptoms before the outbreak of the Covid pandemic. Health officials say that further treatment and rehabilitation programmes will be worked out based on the assessments by the ‘Monon’ team.
00:25 (IST)25 Jun 2020
Pune: B T Kawade Road area to be sealed off for 5 days as cases rise
The Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) on Wednesday declared B T Kawade Road area as containment zone for the second time after increase in Covid-19 cases. The locality alongside the road will be sealed for five days on June 26. Municipal Commissioner Shekhar Gaikwad included B T Kawade Road area in the list of 74 containment zones.
22:45 (IST)24 Jun 2020
Arunachal Pradesh reports first COVID-19 death
A 43-year-old patient from Arunachal Pradesh’s West Kameng district succumbed to COVID-19 in the wee hours of Wednesday morning becoming the state’s first casualty to the virus.
The woman, who was suffering from chronic kidney disease, had returned from Delhi earlier this month. “She was undergoing hemo-dialysis and planning for kidney transplant surgery at Delhi. But due to the prevailing situation the procedure could not be done and returned from Delhi on 11/06/2020,” stated a release from the Directorate of Health Services, Arunachal Pradesh.
The release added that she was referred to Tomo Riba Institute of Health and Medical Sciences (TRIHMS) but her condition deteriorated. “She expired near Shergaon during transfer by ambulance on 24/06/2020 around 4 am” stated the report. It added that “She was cremated following MoH&FW guidelines on dead body management at Dirang by Dirang Administration and Police on 24/06/2020.”
On Wednesday, two people tested positive for the virus in Itanagar Capital Complex (ICC) and Longding. “The cases have been detected from the Facility Quarantine and all are asymptomatic” said the release. As per official data, only one out of the 121 active cases in the state is symptomatic.
All 160 reported cases in Arunachal Pradesh have been found on those who have returned to the state after travel restrictions were lifted in May. Among them are 22 NDRF personnel. Changlang district has the highest number of cases (60), followed by Itanagar Capital Complex (30) and West Kameng (12). The state has tested 20938 people so far. (Express Web Desk/Guwahati)
22:32 (IST)24 Jun 2020
Kerala tightens safety guidelines for expats from the Gulf
With new infections being reported in the state largely among those arriving from Gulf countries, the Kerala government Wednesday decided to tighten safety measures for expats returning to the state in order to contain the transmission of the novel coronavirus.
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, at his routine press briefing in Thiruvananthapuram, announced a slew of measures for the expats returning from the six GCC countries of UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait and Bahrain beginning June 25. Click here to know more about the guidelines.
21:26 (IST)24 Jun 2020
Patanjali applied for immunity booster licence, not Covid-19: Uttarakhand Ayurveda Dept
The Uttarakhand government is set to issue a notice to yoga guru Ramdev’s Patanjali for launching a drug claiming to be a remedy for Covid-19 despite applying a licence for an immunity booster against cough and fever.
Uttarakhand Ayurveda Department’s licence officer Y S Rawat said that a notice is being issued to the firm demanding an explanation about the launch of ‘corona kit’. There is still no proven cure for Covid-19.
“Patanjali Ayurveda Ltd had the licence only for manufacturing an immunity booster against cough and fever. There was nothing in their application related to the treatment of coronavirus,” Rawat said in a statement. More details here.
20:58 (IST)24 Jun 2020
Delhi overtakes Mumbai to become the city with highest Covid-19 caseload
Delhi recorded 3,788 new coronavirus cases on Wednesday taking the total tally to 70,390, while the death toll climbed to 2,635, authorities said, according to PTI. On Tuesday, the national capital reported a record of 3,947 cases, the highest single-day spike till now. On the other hand, Mumbai currently has 69,528 Covid-19 cases.
20:29 (IST)24 Jun 2020
Ongoing lockdown in Bengal was to end on June 30
The ongoing lockdown in West Bengal was to end on June 30.
CM Mamata Banerjee, after attending an all-party meeting held at an auditorium adjacent to the state secretariat, said though there were differences of opinion among the leaders, it was finally decided to extend the curbs till the end of July with relaxations, PTI reported.
Coronavirus LIVE updates: Migrant workers from other states wait to board trains to their home states at the Secunderabad Railway station in Hyderabad. (AP)
The surge has coincided with an increase in the number of samples being tested, and the two things are not unrelated. Telangana had the lowest testing numbers in the entire country, and had to be repeatedly prodded by the High Court to increase tests. Till a week back, by June 16, the state had tested only 44, 431 samples. The first Coronavirus case in the state was detected way back on March 2. In fact, Telangana was the third state in the country to get a Coronavirus positive patient, well before Maharashtra had its first case.
But in the subsequent period, the state had been testing less than 500 samples on an average every day, when states like Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, and even Andhra Pradesh have steadily ramped up their capacities and have now been testing between 10,000 and 20,000 samples every day. In an epidemic like the current one, the general wisdom is that the more samples are tested, the more positive cases are likely to come out.
Meanwhile, the Tamil Nadu government has re-imposed a lockdown in several areas of Madurai district. Chennai and three neighbouring districts are already under a 12-day lockdown till the end of this month. These area are driving up the numbers for the state, which now has a caseload of over 62,000.
Delhi, on the other hand, is giving rise to serious concern. It is growing at the fastest rate among the top ten states, and has added close to 20,000 cases in the last one week alone, almost one-third of its entire caseload. At this rate, within a couple of days, it is likely to overtake Mumbai as the city with the maximum caseload.
In another news, the Ministry of Commerce and Industry said the Government e-Marketplace (GeM) portal has made it mandatory for sellers to submit the country of origin while registering any new product on the online procurement portal. In line with this action, the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) is also examining a proposal put forth by a group of traders seeking mandatory ‘country of origin’ tag for products listed on private e-commerce platforms as well, a senior government official told The Indian Express.
This comes at a time when the Centre is pushing the “Aatmanirbhar Bharat” campaign to promote locally produced goods and several departments have also launched an offensive against imports from China. Additionally, for buyers, the GeM portal has enabled a ‘Make in India’ filter to allow buyers to choose products that meet the minimum 50% local content criteria.
The Shenai Banquet opposite LNJP hospital in Delhi has been turned into an isolation facility and will start operations from Thursday. (Express photo/Tashi Tobgyal)
Coronavirus LIVE updates: Migrant workers from other states wait to board trains to their home states at the Secunderabad Railway station in Hyderabad. (AP)
India’s Hetero Labs Ltd has priced its generic version of remdesivir, Gilead’s experimental Covid-19 drug, at 5,400 rupees ($71) per 100-milligram vial, the drugmaker said on Wednesday, as it prepares to ship them to hospitals in the country. The privately held company said it would supply 20,000 vials of the drug. Fellow Indian drug firm Cipla Ltd had said on Tuesday that its own version of the antiviral drug remdesivir would be priced below 5,000 rupees. Cipla and Hetero are among a bevy of drugmakers which have licensing agreements with U.S.-based Gilead Sciences Inc, the original manufacturer of remdesivir, to make and sell the drug in 127 low- and middle-income countries.
In a bid to regulate admission of non-Covid patients in the hospitals, the Health Department has warned both private and government hospitals that strict action will be taken if patients were denied admission for treatment. The government also cautioned private hospitals of suspending licences as well as initiating necessary penal steps if it receives any complaints of patients being denied admission for treatment. “There have been instances of denial of admission and services by the private hospitals and patients suffer due to this lackadaisical attitude of these hospitals. Such denial is an offence under the West Bengal Clinical Establishments (Registration, Regulation and Transparency) Act, 2017 and the West Bengal Clinical Establishment Rules, 2017. If any report of denial of admission or services is received against such private hospital, necessary penal steps, including suspension of licence, will be initiated against the aforesaid hospital,” the order issued by the Health Department said.
A day after Ramdev launched an ayurvedic ‘Corona Kit’ claiming it cured Covid-19, serious questions have emerged over the business practices of Patanjali Ayurved Ltd, the FMCG company that markets Patanjali brand products and Divya Pharmacy, the unit producing the medicines. On Wednesday, a day after the Ministry of Ayush ordered Patanjali to stop publicising claims of Covid-19 cure, the Uttarakhand government said its licencing authority did not grant any approval to the Corona Kit, and the Rajasthan government told The Indian Express it had no knowledge of clinical trials at National Institute of Medical Sciences and Research (NIMS), a private hospital in Jaipur where Covid-19 patients are admitted. Most significantly, when mildly symptomatic patients developed fever during the trials, they were administered allopathic medicines. As it is, the trials were conducted only on asymptomatic and mildly symptomatic patients. Severely symptomatic patients and those with acute respiratory distress syndrome were excluded for enrolment.
There are many parallels one can draw between the novel coronavirus-induced lockdown (gharbandi) and demonetisation (notebandi), in terms of their impact on India’s farm economy. Both resulted in the same thing – demand destruction – albeit through different routes. Either way, the outcome was the same. Notebandi and gharbandi both basically “flattened” farm produce prices, by shifting the demand curves to the left. The demand drop wasn’t due to prices going up. Rather, with consumption being limited to homes — manpower shortages forced many food companies to also curtail production in factories and, hence, cut raw material purchases — there was less demand now for milk, potatoes or tomatoes even at the same price. This wasn’t, in other words, simply a “movement along the demand curve”, but a “leftward shift in the demand curve”.
As many as 75,60,782 samples have been tested so far.
At first glance, the numbers tell a scary story — of Delhi surpassing Mumbai to become the city with the highest Covid-19 cases in the country. And the fact that a third of the capital’s 70,390 cases have been recorded in the past week. A closer look at the capital’s evolving Covid response, though, suggests that the surge in cases is closely tied to significantly increased testing — 1.08 lakh tests, more than a fourth of the total, have been conducted in the corresponding period. So far, the city has tested over 4.2 lakh people using the RT-PCR as well as rapid antigen testing kits. The number of hospital beds has also increased in the past two weeks — from 8,800 on June 10 to 13,400 on Tuesday.
The Covid-19 tally in India rose to 473,105 on Thursday after nearly 17,000 fresh cases were recorded within a span of 24 hours.
The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in Mumbai has become the first major educational institution in the country to scrap all face-to-face lectures for the rest of the year due to the pandemic. In an announcement made late Wednesday night, director Subhasis Chaudhuri said the institute would teach the next semester “purely in the online mode so that there is no compromise on the safety and well being of the students”. “The COVID Pandemic has made us at IIT Bombay rethink the way we impart education to our students. To ensure that our students begin the academic year without further delay, we are planning on extensive online classes details of which will be informed to all students in due course of time,” he wrote in a Facebook post shared close to midnight.
With 3,788 new Covid-19 cases being reported on Tuesday, Delhi has overtaken Mumbai as the city with the highest case count — 70,390 cases so far. The total case count in Mumbai, which reported 1,118 new cases in the last 24 hours, is 69,528. While Delhi has done 4.2 lakh tests so far (about 22,142 per million), Mumbai 2.94 lakh tests (22,668 per million). Mumbai’s positivity rate (23.2%) remains higher than Delhi (16.7%); Delhi also has fewer deaths (2,365) than Mumbai (3,964). With the number of cases still rising, the Delhi government has prepared an ambitious plan —house-to-house screening in containment zones by June 30, and in the rest of the city by July 6.
The Assam government has started a mental health support programme for Covid patients and quarantined persons in the state to provide emotional support, counselling and treatment. The programme, called ‘Monon’, was started on June 17. The team behind it comprises 220 psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, psychiatric social workers, and trained voluntary counsellors. It is led by Dr Mythili Hazarika, an Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology at Gauhati Medical College and Hospital. “This is a unique kind of a programme, where the mental health professionals are calling those who might need help rather than just waiting for them to call us,” Hazarika told The Indian Express. She added that each person on the team is allotted to call at least 15 Covid patients per day.
Around 2.30 pm Wednesday, more than 30 people stood in a queue outside a CRPF bus at Sarvodaya Enclave's gate number 2, some visibly anxious as the line slowly moved forward. The bus is a makeshift laboratory aimed at providing free and fast Covid test results to area residents, with officials saying such mobile testing labs have become crucial in assessing the spread of the virus.
"For the past several days, we have been carrying out mobile tests in many parts of South Delhi. Testing trucks are stationed at vantage points as well as in and around containment zones. We have observed that in many areas, several domestic helps, shopkeepers and people whose jobs involve visiting multiple places reside. In such a case, testing becomes crucial since the data gives an idea of where the infection is spreading. We also carry out surveys to ensure testing vans are placed in such a manner to provide maximum coverage," said Kapil Chaudhary, South Delhi sub-divisional magistrate.
The makeshift testing centre involves a bus where the testing kit is placed and a registration counter outside. A lab technician handles the testing paraphernalia, while another makes reports. A driver and two CRPF guards are also present. A government doctor oversees the operations. The resident welfare associations of these areas help the SDM arrange the mobile testing facility.
Bringing yet another change in its testing protocol, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) will now allow all those over the age of 70 to undergo testing for Covid-19 without prescription. The BMC, which had earlier warned doctors of disciplinary action if they recommended tests to patients without physical examination, has now decided to review this rule as well stating that e-prescriptions will also be allowed for testing. Read more here
The number of persons infected with coronavirus disease (Covid-19) in Pimpri-Chinchwad crossed 2,000 on Tuesday, as was predicted by the civic administration at the start of the month.
"At the civic general body meeting held earlier in the month, I had predicted that Covid-19 cases will rise to between 2,000 and 3,000. In the next few days, we expect the number of cases to touch the 3,000 mark," Municipal Commissioner Shravan Hardikar told The Indian Express. Read more here
The Assam government has started a mental health support programme for Covid patients and quarantined persons in the state to provide emotional support, counselling and treatment. The programme, called ‘Monon’, was started on June 17. The team behind it comprises 220 psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, psychiatric social workers, and trained voluntary counsellors. It is led by Dr Mythili Hazarika, an Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology at Gauhati Medical College and Hospital.
In the first six days, the ‘Monon’ team made a total of 2,543 calls to under-treatment Covid patients or those who have recovered. Out of this, 1,212 persons needed counselling. According to official figures, out of the 1,200-odd people who needed counselling, 94 were found to be depressed, 139 with symptoms of clinical anxiety and at least nine people suffered suicidal tendencies. But of the diagnosed people, 43 had psychiatric symptoms before the outbreak of the Covid pandemic. Health officials say that further treatment and rehabilitation programmes will be worked out based on the assessments by the ‘Monon’ team.
The Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) on Wednesday declared B T Kawade Road area as containment zone for the second time after increase in Covid-19 cases. The locality alongside the road will be sealed for five days on June 26. Municipal Commissioner Shekhar Gaikwad included B T Kawade Road area in the list of 74 containment zones.
A 43-year-old patient from Arunachal Pradesh’s West Kameng district succumbed to COVID-19 in the wee hours of Wednesday morning becoming the state’s first casualty to the virus.
The woman, who was suffering from chronic kidney disease, had returned from Delhi earlier this month. “She was undergoing hemo-dialysis and planning for kidney transplant surgery at Delhi. But due to the prevailing situation the procedure could not be done and returned from Delhi on 11/06/2020,” stated a release from the Directorate of Health Services, Arunachal Pradesh.
The release added that she was referred to Tomo Riba Institute of Health and Medical Sciences (TRIHMS) but her condition deteriorated. “She expired near Shergaon during transfer by ambulance on 24/06/2020 around 4 am” stated the report. It added that “She was cremated following MoH&FW guidelines on dead body management at Dirang by Dirang Administration and Police on 24/06/2020.”
On Wednesday, two people tested positive for the virus in Itanagar Capital Complex (ICC) and Longding. “The cases have been detected from the Facility Quarantine and all are asymptomatic” said the release. As per official data, only one out of the 121 active cases in the state is symptomatic.
All 160 reported cases in Arunachal Pradesh have been found on those who have returned to the state after travel restrictions were lifted in May. Among them are 22 NDRF personnel. Changlang district has the highest number of cases (60), followed by Itanagar Capital Complex (30) and West Kameng (12). The state has tested 20938 people so far. (Express Web Desk/Guwahati)
With new infections being reported in the state largely among those arriving from Gulf countries, the Kerala government Wednesday decided to tighten safety measures for expats returning to the state in order to contain the transmission of the novel coronavirus.
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, at his routine press briefing in Thiruvananthapuram, announced a slew of measures for the expats returning from the six GCC countries of UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait and Bahrain beginning June 25. Click here to know more about the guidelines.
The Uttarakhand government is set to issue a notice to yoga guru Ramdev’s Patanjali for launching a drug claiming to be a remedy for Covid-19 despite applying a licence for an immunity booster against cough and fever.
Uttarakhand Ayurveda Department’s licence officer Y S Rawat said that a notice is being issued to the firm demanding an explanation about the launch of ‘corona kit’. There is still no proven cure for Covid-19.
“Patanjali Ayurveda Ltd had the licence only for manufacturing an immunity booster against cough and fever. There was nothing in their application related to the treatment of coronavirus,” Rawat said in a statement. More details here.
Delhi recorded 3,788 new coronavirus cases on Wednesday taking the total tally to 70,390, while the death toll climbed to 2,635, authorities said, according to PTI. On Tuesday, the national capital reported a record of 3,947 cases, the highest single-day spike till now. On the other hand, Mumbai currently has 69,528 Covid-19 cases.
The ongoing lockdown in West Bengal was to end on June 30.
CM Mamata Banerjee, after attending an all-party meeting held at an auditorium adjacent to the state secretariat, said though there were differences of opinion among the leaders, it was finally decided to extend the curbs till the end of July with relaxations, PTI reported.