A woman gets vaccinated in Navi Mumbai on Wednesday (Express photo by Amit Chakravarty)Coronavirus India Live Updates: Dr Reddy’s in a statement Wednesday said that the soft launch of Sputnik V vaccine in India, which was initiated in Hyderabad, has been scaled up to many cities including Bengaluru, Mumbai, Kolkata, Delhi, Chennai, among others. It added that registration on CoWIN was not open to public yet, but will be open at the time of commercial launch.
Meanwhile, drugs such as ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, favipiravir and antibiotics like doxycycline and azithromycin prescribed for adult Covid patients are not recommended for treating children, stated a government guideline issued on Wednesday. The guidelines by the Union Health Ministry said the decision has been taken since most of these drugs used in adults are have not been tested on children for prevention or treatment of Covid infection among them.
India recorded 62,224 new Covid-19 cases and 2,542 deaths in the last 24 hours. With this, the country’s overall caseload rose to 2.96 crore, while the death toll surged to 3.62 lakh. Kerala is the top contributor, adding 12,246 new cases to the country’s caseload. The number of fresh cases reported in the last 24 hours are 212 in Delhi, 830 in Mumbai, 1,611 in Bengaluru, 377 in Kolkata and 689 in Chennai.
Meanwhile, in a statement, the government said that its decision to increase the gap between two shots of Covishield from 4-6 weeks to 12-16 weeks lies in “fundamental scientific reason regarding behaviour of adenovector vaccines”, according to the National Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (NTAGI).
Parents buying textbooks and other study material for their kids at a stationery shop in Appa Balvant Chowk, Pune on June 11, 2021. (Express Photo by Pavan Khengre)
Sikkim has reported 147 new Covid-19 cases on Wednesday pushing the caseload to 18,806, a health department bulletin said.
The Himalayan state reported one more death due to the infection, taking the death toll to 285.
Sikkim now has 2,965 active cases, while 249 others have migrated to other states and 15,307 patients have recovered from the disease, the bulletin said. PTI
The Congress on Wednesday said party chief Sonia Gandhi has taken both doses of COVID-19 vaccine while Rahul Gandhi could not take the jabs yet as he had contracted the virus in May. A senior party functionary said Rahul Gandhi was scheduled to take the vaccine on May 16, but he tested positive for the coronavirus a day before.
"Congress president Sonia Gandhi has taken both doses of the vaccine. Rahul Gandhi will take the vaccine after his mandatory wait period ends," a senior leader told PTI. (PTI)
Even as the second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic is on the wane, vaccine shortages continue to be reported from across the country.
The Union Health Ministry on Wednesday said that the total number of Covid vaccine doses administered in the country has gone past 26.53 crore, including more than 4.81 crore doses administered to people in the 18-44 age group. Cumulatively, 4,72,06,953 people in the 18-44 age group have received the first dose and 9,68,098 have been given the second dose since the start of the third phase of the vaccination drive across the country. Read full report
The total number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the country has gone past 26.53 crore, including more than 4.81 crore doses administered to people in the 18-44 age group, the health ministry said on Wednesday. It said 20,67,085 beneficiaries in the 18-44 age group received the first dose and 67,447 got the second dose of the vaccine on Wednesday.
Cumulatively, 4,72,06,953 people in the said age group have received the first dose and 9,68,098 have been given the second dose since the start of the third phase of the vaccination drive across the country.
Bihar, Delhi, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Telangana, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal have administered the first dose of the vaccine to more than 10 lakh beneficiaries each in the 18-44 age group. (PTI)
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday saluted the doctors who succumbed to COVID-19 while risking their lives in treating coronavirus patients during the pandemic. He said this after the Indian Medical Association (IMA) released a list of 730 doctors who lost their lives during the second wave of the pandemic, with the maximum of 115 from Bihar and another 109 from Delhi.
"I salute each one of these doctors for risking their lives to save our nation from Corona crisis. These martyrs braved adversities and hardships but never gave up. My condolences to those who have the honour of calling them their family and friends," he said, sharing the state-wise list of the doctors given by the IMA. (PTI)
Uttarakhand govt orders Haridwar district administration to register an FIR in the alleged Covid testing scam during Kumbh. An order has been issued to file case against labs from Delhi and Haryana which conducted testing at 5 places in Haridwar during Kumbh Mela (ANI)
Punjab records 688 new cases, 46 deaths and 1383 discharges.
Shin Bong-kil, outgoing South Korean envoy to India, has said no quarantine is required for Indians in South Korea if they have been vaccinated with Covishield. But quarantine is mandatory for Covaxin recipients, he said. (ANI)
Soft launch of Sputnik V vaccine in India, which was initiated in Hyderabad, has been scaled up to many cities including Bengaluru, Mumbai, Kolkata, Delhi, Chennai among others, states Dr Reddy’s. It adds that registration on CoWIN not open to public yet, will be open at the time of commercial launch. (ANI)
The Supreme Court has said that non-listing of plea for regular bail impinges upon liberty of the person in custody and advocated that under the prevailing Covid-19 pandemic, at least half of the judges should sit on alternate days so that hearing is accorded to those in distress.
Expressing “shock” that a bail plea filed in the Punjab and Haryana High Court was not listed for hearing for over a year, the apex court said denial of hearing is an infringement of right and liberty assured to an accused.
“Even during the pandemic, when all courts are making attempts to hear and decide all matter, non-listing of such an application for bail defeats the administration of justice,” said a vacation bench of Justices Hemant Gupta and V Ramasubramanian. (PTI) Read more
Karnataka reports 7,345 fresh cases and 148 deaths, Out of the new cases, 1611 were from Bengaluru.
The Bombay High Court on Wednesday asked the Maharashtra government to inform the court of the steps it can take to protect cigarette smokers, who as per the state, were more vulnerable to contracting COVID-19.
A bench of Justices SP Deshmukh and GS Kulkarni asked Maharashtra Advocate General Ashutosh Kumbhakoni to file an affidavit listing such steps by next week.
It was hearing a bunch of public interest litigations on the management of drugs and resources related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The HC's direction came after Kumbhakoni told the bench that experts at the Tata Memorial Centre, that works under the Union government's Atomic Energy Department, had submitted their opinion before the state government on June 15 referring to various global studies "indicating that smokers were more vulnerable" to contracting COVID-19.
Kumbhakoni said a majority of the studies the experts had referred to, stated that smokers were more vulnerable to contracting the deadly viral infection and also that the degree of severity of the disease was higher in people who smoked cigarettes. (PTI)
Tamil Nadu reports 10,448 new cases, 21,058 recoveries and 270 deaths. Chennai recorded 689 new cases and 42 deaths.
Mumbai has reported 830 fresh cases in the last 24 hours. There are 14,907 active cases and the recovery rate is at 95%.
West Bengal reports 3,187 new cases, 2,012 discharges and 69 deaths in the last 24 hours. Kolkata recorded 377 fresh cases and 13 deaths.
Total number of maternal deaths during both the waves of pandemic were 2%, out of which majority were due to Covid-induced pneumonia and respiratory failure, states ICMR.
It adds that adds per comparative analysis of data from pregnant women and postpartum women during the first and second waves of the pandemic, symptomatic cases were significantly higher at 28.7% in 2nd wave compared to 1st wave (14.2%). Case fatality rate (CFR) was 5.7% during 2nd wave than 0.7% in 1st wave. (ANI)
Madhya Pradesh records 160 fresh cases, 34 deaths and 463 recoveries.
A study of over 31,000 vaccinated healthcare workers at Apollo Hospital units across the country has found that less than 5% were infected with Covid, with a small percentage of hospitalisation and no mortalities.
The study, covering the period from the start of the vaccine drive on January 16 to May 31, covered 31,621 healthcare workers (HCWs) from 43 units of Apollo Hospitals in 24 cities. Among the HCWs, 25,907 or 81.9% were fully vaccinated while 5,714 or 18.1% had received only the first dose. Read more
Uttarakhand reports 353 new cases, 398 recoveries, and six deaths in the last 24 hours.
Indian Medical Association (IMA) says 730 doctors have died during second wave of Covid-19 pandemic — most doctors lost their lives in Bihar (115), followed by Delhi (109).