West Bengal recorded its highest single-day spike in COVID-19 infections with 1894 new cases.

According to data provided by the West Bengal government, as of July 17, there are presently 14,709 active cases. The total number of COVID-19 cases as of today is 38,011. In the last 24 hours, the state has recorded 26 deaths. Of these numbers, 563 new COVID-19 cases and 12 new deaths have been recorded in Kolkata alone.

The total number of COVID-19 related deaths in state as of July 17 is 1,049. The Bengal government states that 838 patients have been discharged and 13,240 samples have been tested in the last 24 hours.

The Kerala government Friday confirmed the community spread of coronavirus in two coastal areas in Thiruvananthapuram district. The development, which is indicative of the vulnerability of coastal areas to the virus, comes even as nearly 800 new cases were reported in the state in the last 24 hours with total Covid-19 count surging past 11,000.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, at the daily briefing, said community transmission of the coronavirus is observed to have taken place in the coastal neighbourhoods of Pulluvila and Poonthura in the capital district. He also indicated that a complete lockdown is likely to be imposed in Thiruvananthapuram’s coastal areas.

“Three zones will be demarcated. The first zone will be from Anchuthengu to Perumathura. The second zone is from Perumathura to Vizhinjam and the third zone from Vizhinjam to Urambu. A special police mechanism has been designed to bring the situation in these areas under control,” the CM said.

The tough measures are being enforced citing high case positivity rate, especially in the coastal areas where the density of population is higher and social distancing measures impractical. More details here.

No passenger flights will operate to Kolkata from Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Pune, Chennai, Nagpur and Ahmedabad between until July 31, the Kolkata airport extended its ban on Friday.

The restriction on arriving flights to #KolkataAirport from 6 cities viz Delhi, Mumbai,Pune,Chennai, Nagpur & Ahmedabad has been extended upto 31st July.@AAI_Official @MoCA_GoI @HardeepSPuri @arvsingh01 @PIB_India @wbdhfw @HomeBengal @MoHFW_INDIA

— Kolkata Airport (@aaikolairport) July 17, 2020

A 92-year-old male patient of coronavirus recovered from the infection in Indore, one of the COVID-19 hotspots in the country, an official said on Friday. The nonagenarian, a resident of neighbouring Mhow town, had been admitted to a private hospital in Indore after he tested COVID-19 positive, the official said. The man was discharged from the hospital following his recovery, he said. Earlier, a 95-year-old woman had also recovered from this deadly infection in the district. (PTI)

Amid the rising number of novel coronavirus cases in Bihar, the state opposition parties Friday urged the Election Commission to ensure “substantial public participation and level playing field in 2020 Bihar polls”. They also urged the poll body to assure voters that the upcoming polls do not become a “super spreader event” amid the pandemic.

The parties including Congress, Rashtriya Janata Dal, Hindustani Awam Morcha, Rashtriya Lok Samta Party, and Loktantrik Janata Dal submitted a memorandum to the poll panel drawing its attention to the coronavirus situation in the state.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has affected the state badly. In the capital city, Patna, as many as 89 containment zones and over 16 districts have been put under lockdown for another fifteen days with effect from 16th July,” the memorandum said.

As many as 791 new Covid-19 positive cases, 133 recoveries and one death have been reported in Kerala today, Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan said during the media briefing.

As Kerala reports 791 new Covid-19 cases on Friday, the highest single-day hike so far, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan during a media briefing admitted to community spread in certain coastal areas of Thiruvanathapuram such as Poonthura and Pulluvila.

#Covid Covid cases in Kerala break new ground. State report 791 new cases today, the highest single day hike so far. CM Vijayan says community spread in certain coastal areas of Thiruvananthapuram district, where situation grim. total cases at 11066 @IndianExpress

— shaju philip (@shajuexpress) July 17, 2020

The COVID-19 lockdown-led reduction in air pollution levels across five Indian cities in India, including Delhi and Mumbai, may have prevented about 630 premature deaths, and saved USD 690 million in health costs in the country, a new study claims.

Scientists, including those from the University of Surrey in the UK, assessed the levels of harmful fine particulate matter (PM2.5) from vehicles and other sources in five Indian cities -- Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai and Hyderabad -- since the beginning of the lockdown period.

The study, published in the journal Sustainable Cities and Society, compared these lockdown PM2.5 figures from 25 March up until 11 May, with those from similar periods of the preceding five years, and found that the measure reduced pollution levels in all these places, news agency PTI reported.

According to the scientists, during this period, the levels of these harmful air pollutants reduced by 10 per cent in Mumbai, and by up to 54 per cent in Delhi.

"The percentage reduction for the other cities ranged from 24 to 32 per cent, which were slightly smaller than the measured values for Delhi and Mumbai," the scientists noted in the study.

In the initial days of India’s first lockdown in March, consumers responded to the Covid-19 crisis with anxiety and fear, leading to panic buying of staples and hygiene products. As cases continue to increase and the economy shrinks, the consumer is adapting.

A recent report on the impact of Covid-19 on consumer sentiment and behaviour by Mckinsey & Co, published on July 8, after conducting weekly, bi-weekly and monthly surveys in 12 countries, said that 91 per cent Indians changed their shopping behaviour due to the crisis. Many urban consumers, increasingly working from home and reluctant to deal with crowded public places, are moving online for their shopping needs. If demonetisation compelled people to shift toward cashless payments, Covid-19 has made them adopt online shopping.

There has been more than 10 per cent growth in online shopping across categories during the pandemic globally, according to Mckinsey, and it is expected that consumers will continue with this practice even if brick-and-mortar stores reopen. Globally, one in five consumers who ordered their last groceries online did so for the first time. For consumers aged 56 years and above, this figure was one in three, said Accenture, in a similar research report published in April. These days, people are buying larger pack-size products or multiple units at once. Click here to read our explainer.

Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa Friday reiterated that the lockdown announced in different parts of the state including capital city Bengaluru will not be extended further.

In a meeting with MPs, ministers and top government officials in Bengaluru, the CM said, “Lockdown is not a solution to Covid-19 woes. We will not be extending the lockdown further.”

Yediyurappa had said the same earlier this week after a meeting with the Karnataka Covid-19 task force as well.

The Karnataka government had decided to enforce a full lockdown in the Bengaluru urban and rural districts from July 14 evening to July 22 in the wake of mounting Covid-19 cases over the last week. Several other parts of the state including Dakshina Kannada, Dharwad, and Kalaburagi are also in lockdown currently. More info here.

The COVID-19 tally shot past the 40,000 mark in Andhra Pradesh on Friday as 2,062 fresh cases were added in the last 24 hours.

The state's COVID-19 table now showed a total of 40,646 positive cases, with 19,814 of them being active after 20,298 patients were discharged, news agency PTI reported.

With 42 new casualties reported in the last 24 hours, the overall toll mounted to 534, the latest bulletin said. It said 837 patients had recovered and been discharged from hospitals in the last 24 hours.

The Madhya Pradesh Assembly's Monsoon session, which was scheduled to begin here from July 20, has been postponed in light of the coronavirus pandemic, news agency PTI reported on Friday.

The decision to defer the session was taken unanimously at an all-party meeting on Friday chaired by pro-tem speaker Rameshwar Sharma, an Assembly official said.

The meeting was attended by Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Leader of Opposition Kamal Nath and Home and Legislative Affairs Minister Narottam Mishra, among others, he said.

The Uttarakhand government Friday decided to impose a complete lockdown in the state on weekends in view of the surging cases of COVID-19.

"To curb the spread of Covid-19, it has been decided to impose lockdown on Saturdays and Sundays in the state. Guidelines for the same to be issued soon," Uttarakhand CM Trivendra Singh Rawat was quoted as saying by ANI.

A total of 3,982 people have been infected by the novel coronavirus in Uttarakhand. As many as 50 people have also died of Covid-19 in the state.

To curb the spread of #COVID19, it has been decided to impose lockdown on Saturdays and Sundays in the state. Guidelines for the same to be issued soon: Uttarakhand CM Trivendra Singh Rawat (File pic) pic.twitter.com/zoWdVRdSvT

— ANI (@ANI) July 17, 2020

Districts in Madhya Pradesh may be the most vulnerable to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, followed by those in Bihar and Telangana, according to a study in The Lancet journal which assessed several key indicators like housing, hygiene, and the health system in these states, news agency PTI reported.

According to scientists, including Rajib Acharya from the Population Council, New Delhi, vulnerability in the research means the risk of consequences of infection, including spread, morbidity, mortality, and social and economic effects of the pandemic. The study noted that nine of 30 large states -- Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Telangana, Jharkhand, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, West Bengal, Odisha, and Gujarat -- have high vulnerability to be impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

It rated the vulnerabilities of the states to the pandemic on a scale from zero to one, measured using 15 indicators across five domains -- socioeconomic, demographic, housing and hygiene, epidemiological, and health system.

Fifty-two more people, including seven ITBP personnel, tested positive for the virus in Arunachal Pradesh on Friday, taking the state's tally to 543, a health department official said. Of the new cases, 42 were reported in the Capital Complex region, seven in East Siang district and three in Upper Subansiri, State Surveillance Officer Dr L Jampa said. "The detection of 52 patients is the second-highest single-day spike of Covid-19 cases in Arunachal Pradesh as 75 people had tested positive for the disease on July 15," he said.

A 92-year-old Italian national was among the three people who succumbed to coronavirus in Puducherry, taking the tally of infections in the union territory to 1,832 on Friday. Director of Health and Family Welfare Services S Mohan Kumar told a virtual press conference that the Italian national had co-morbidities and was admitted to JIPMER on July 2. He tested positive for the virus and died on Thursday. With the death of three people, the toll has shot up to 25 in Puducherry during the last 24 hours.

With the detection of 35,000 new infections on Thursday, India now has more than one million people who have been infected with the novel Coronavirus at some point of time. Only two other countries have had more infections till now – the United States where more than 3.4 million people have so far been infected, and Brazil, where this number is touching two million. In all these three countries, the disease is still spreading at a rapid rate. India has just started to add more than 30,000 cases per day. In the last two days, about 32,000 and 35,000 new infections were detected. The other two countries are routinely adding many more per day. In the United States, for example, more than 50,000 infections were detected every day for the last one week. The numbers have fluctuated in Brazil, but for most of this month, it has added more than 40,000 cases every day. Click here to read more.

A four-member team from the Central government visited Surat on Friday to review the coronavirus situation in the city, which has emerged as the new hotspot in Gujarat, and to provide necessary guidance to the local authorities, PTI reported. AIIMS director Dr Randeep Guleria, a member of the team, expressed confidence that just like Ahmedabad, the viral outbreak will be brought under control in Surat as well. The expert team comprised Guleria, NITI Aayog member Vinod Paul, director general of ICMR Dr Balram Bhargava and additional secretary in the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare Arti Ahuja. The team held discussions with senior officials and doctors of the civil hospital about the present situation, treatment protocols and availability of medicines to fight the pandemic, an official said. The team also visited containment zones in the city before leaving for Ahmedabad. Speaking to reporters, Guleria said he was hopeful of curbing the COVID-19 spread in Surat, a hub of diamond and textile units. "We held detailed discussions on various aspects like patient management, medicines and plasma therapy. We understood the issues and gave solutions. We are confident that cases will come down in the near future just like they did in Ahmedabad," he said. Surat district in south Gujarat has seen a sharp rise in infections in recent days and recorded 9,451 Covid-19 cases and 395 deaths so far, second only to Ahmedabad.

Even as Bengaluru is under a week long lockdown till July 22, the city Mayor and commissioner of the civic body have favoured its extension, aimed at controlling the spread of the virus. Speculations are once again rife that the current lockdown is likely to be extended for 15 days, as that much time is required to break the chain. "We are seeing that people are still coming out despite the lockdown. The awareness has not come among the people and even those who have an understanding about the virus are not maintaining social distancing," Mayor M Goutham Kumar was quoted as saying by PTI. Speaking to reporters, he opined that in such a situation, it was fine if there was an extension, "because we have to cut the chain." "If there is a serious lockdown for fourteen days, I feel that the chain can be cut," he said. Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike Commissioner B H Anil Kumar said if the chain has to be broken, the 15 day cycle has to end. "There is already a one week long lockdown. The Chief Minister is holding a meeting, where a decision will be taken. In my personal opinion it will be good if the lockdown is for 15 days," he said.