Another 300 oxygenated beds are being set up Sassoon General Hospital at a cost of Rsv 3.5 crore, while the 11-storeyed super specialty building on the campus has a total of 514 operational beds. The Pune division administration is keen on setting up 800 to 850 beds at the largest government hospital in the state for Covid-19 patients. In the process, a liquid oxygen tank with a capacity of six kilolitre, meant for Aundh Civil Hospital, was redirected to Sassoon on priority so that oxygenated beds could soon be made operational. The tank is being installed at the Infosys super-specialty building on the campus, which houses neurosurgery, urosurgery, and other departments. At least 70 beds in this building will be used for Covid patients. Another tank of liquid oxygen with the same capacity will be set up near the paediatrics department, where 110 to 120 beds will be converted for Covid patients. Click here to read more.

The administration in Pune will not allow processions for idol immersion at the end of the 10-day Ganesh festival this year, so as to control the spread of Covid-19. While the outbreak has slowed down in the district, it still remains the worst-hit in the country. The annual festival will begin on August 22. At a Covid-19 review meeting in Pune, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar deliberated over the question with senior officials and elected representatives. It was decided that permission to conduct the immersion procession on Laxmi Road – as well as other smaller processions elsewhere in the district – could not be allowed.

With the spread of Covid-19 to over 300 villages in Aurangabad district, state minister Subhash Desai has instructed the authorities to increase testing in rural areas. “At least 15 contacts of a positive patient should be traced. Besides, people should be tested before they enter villages,” Desai, who is also the district guardian minister, asked the officials to enhance contact tracing of patients, was quoted as saying by news agency PTI.

Shops and business entities, barring malls and some other establishments, will be allowed to reopen outside COVID-19 hotspots in Thane city on all days from August 15, the local civic body has said. The Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC), in an order issued on Thursday evening, said the decision has been taken in view of demands from citizens and businessmen to allow normal public activities outside the designated COVID-19 hotspots. (PTI)

Nagpur district of Maharashtra recorded its highest single-day spike of over 1,000 COVID-19 cases on Friday, a district official said. With the detection of 1,036 COVID-19 cases, the district's COVID-19 tally has reached 12,745, the official told PTI.

With a single-day rise of 12,608 cases on Friday, Maharashtra's COVID-19 count rose to 5,72,734, the state health department said. The death of 364 patients during the day pushed the fatality count to 19,427, it said in a statement. As many as 10,484 patients were discharged on Friday following their recovery, the department added. With this, a total of 4,01,442 COVID-19 patients have recovered in the state till now. (PTI)

The Maharashtra government Friday said that it will provide Rs 50 lakh insurance cover amount to the wife of a rural development officer in Parbhani district after he died of COVID-19 which contracted while on duty, a government resolution (GR) has said. The state government had last month decided to provide such cover till September-end to its staffers at gram panchayat and zilla parishads who are engaged in containing the coronavirus spread, PTI reported.

A day after Transport Minister Anil Parab said that it is up to the Railways to start special trains within Maharashtra for Ganesh Chathurthi as the state government has already given an in-principle approval to it, the Central Railways (CR) on Thursday reiterated that it is yet to receive a final go ahead from the state.

“Central Railway wishes to inform the passengers that it is ready to run the specials, however, the final go ahead is yet to be confirmed by the state government of Maharashtra,” CR said in a statement on Thursday. It added that the Railways is ready to run the specials subject to all norms, including social distancing.

Pune’s first Covid Care Centre in a residential housing society has come up in Chinchwad area. The 40-bed centre will admit patients with mild symptoms or those who are asymptomatic.

“It is the first Covid Care Centre in a residential society set up in Pimpri-Chinchwad as per the government’s guidelines. It is for the society members,” Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Commissioner Shravan Hardikar told The Indian Express on Thursday.

The Covid Care Centre was inaugurated at Queens Town Society, which is located near Lokmanya Hospital in Chinchwad. It was inaugurated by PCMC Deputy Municipal Commissioner Ajit Pawar on Wednesday.

WITH THE National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test (NEET) for admission to super-specialty courses scheduled for September 15, recruiting specialist doctors, even on a contract basis for Covid care, has become a challenge. For instance, only six specialists sent in online applications as against 204 posts advertised by Pune Zilla Parishad.

Till Thursday afternoon, Pune recorded 1.15 lakh cases and 2,619 deaths. In rural areas, there are 254 deaths and cases touching 10,000. The ZP administration has issued a second advertisement to recruit 1,124 healthcare workers. Till August 16, online applications for 1,124 posts have been invited, out of which 256 are for doctors from Ayurveda Yoga Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy (AYUSH), 56 for dentists, 300 for staff nurses, 476 for auxiliary nurse midwives (ANM) for a period of three to six months, and another 32 for data entry operators. In the last round, officials said they were able to fill up 410 posts out of 1,489 posts advertised earlier.

The Maharashtra Common Entrance Test (CET) cell is conducting a survey on the feasibility of conducting entrance tests across the state. An announcement in this regard is expected within a week, said State Higher and Technical Education Minister Uday Samant, who was visiting Pune on Thursday.

“…An assessment is underway to see if exams can be conducted at the district level, keeping in mind physical distancing restrictions, or at the taluka level, if adequate infrastructure is available. A committee headed by Dr Abhay Wagh, director of technical education, and Dr Dhanraj Mane, director of higher education, has been constituted to conduct the survey and submit a report,” he said.

The University Grants Commission (UGC) on Thursday termed the decisions of the Maharashtra and Delhi governments to cancel final exams as “void ab initio”. The UGC said this in reply to affidavits filed by the two governments in the Supreme Court, where petitions challenging the UGC’s direction to universities/institutions to hold the final exams by September-end are pending.

UGC said Delhi “has unilaterally chosen to cancel the final year / terminal semester examinations and graduate students using ‘alternative assessment measures’ in contravention of the UGC’s Guidelines…”. The decision “encroaches on the legislative field of coordinating and determining the standards of higher education that is exclusively reserved for Parliament…”, the affidavit added.

Hyderabad-headquartered Biological E (BE) on Thursday announced agreements to aid in manufacturing two Covid-19 vaccine candidates–one developed by drug giant Johnson and Johnson’s arm and the other by Houson-based academic institution Baylor College of Medicine. If the candidates are successful, the firm may be able to rapidly scale up production of at least one of these candidates to make “several hundred million” doses.

The development may put BE right behind Pune-headquartered Serum Institute of India as a potential global supplier of Covid-19 vaccines. The firm is the second to announce a manufacturing agreement with a large global drugmaker in the ongoing race to find a shot against the contagious virus.

Hyderabad-based Biological E has entered into two agreements for development of novel Coronavirus vaccines, one with drug giant Johnson & Johnson, and the other with Houston-based Baylor College of Medicine.

Biological E is the second major pharmaceutical player in India to announce agreements with vaccine developers for the manufacture of these candidate vaccines. It could facilitate the deployment of these vaccines in India after they are approved for use. Earlier, Pune-based Serum Institute of India, the world’s largest manufacturer of vaccines by volume, has entered into similar agreements with AstraZeneca, which is developing a vaccine with Oxford University, and with US-based Novavax. The candidate vaccines of AstraZeneca and Novavax are both in phase-3 human trials.

Rana's health deteriorated on Thursday after she developed breathing problem, she is being rushed to Lilavati Hospital in Mumbai by road, a journey which will take 12 to 15 hours, on advice of doctors attending her. The Member of Parliament tested positive for coronavirus along with her MLA-husband Ravi Rana on August 6, they said. After initial treatment in Amravati, she was admitted to Nagpur's Wockhardt Hospital. Besides the politician-couple, more than half a dozen members of their family have also tested positive for COVID-19. (PTI)

Amravati Lok Sabha MP Navneet Rana, who was admitted in Wockhardt Hospital here two days ago after testing positive for coronavirus, is being shifted to Mumbai for further treatment, the hospital and her family said on Thursday evening. When contacted, Wockhardt Hospital PRO K Sujatha told PTI that the independent MP was admitted to the private medical facility in Nagpur on August 11 after she tested positive for coronavirus in her hometown Amravati. However, she was discharged this evening and is being shifted to Mumbai for further treatment, Sujatha said.

Maharashtra recorded 413 new Covid-19 deaths on Thursday – its highest ever in a single day – taking its overall toll to 19,063. The state contributes to almost 40 per cent of the country’s death count.

In just 13 days of August, Maharashtra has recorded 4,069 deaths due to coronavirus, 58 per cent of what it had recorded in July and 74 per cent in June.

Mumbai recorded 48 deaths on Thursday, taking the city’s toll to 6,991. A month ago, Mumbai accounted for 25 to 30 per cent of the daily deaths reported across the state. Its share has now shrunk further to 11 per cent in daily deaths.

Good morning and welcome to our Maharashtra coronavirus live blog. The state has 5.6 lakh cases and 19,063 people have died so far. Follow to get all the latest updates here