Kerala had recorded 38,684 fresh infections yesterday and 42,677 COVID-19 cases on Thursday. (File/PTI)Coronavirus Omicron India news highlights: Kerala continued to witness a dip in the daily Covid-19 infection rate for the third consecutive day, with the state reporting 33,538 new positive cases on Saturday taking the caseload to 62,44,654. Kerala had recorded 38,684 fresh infections yesterday and 42,677 Covid-19 cases on Thursday. The state reported 444 Covid-19-related deaths on Saturday, taking the death toll to 57,740.
India reported a single-day rise of 1,27,952 new Covid-19 cases Saturday, registering a decline from Friday’s 1,49,394 new infections. The Union Health Ministry update also said that the country sae 1,059 deaths in the last 24 hours. The number of active cases now stands at 13,31,648. India’s overall death toll crossed 5 lakh, while the daily positivity rate stood at 7.98%. Among cities, the number of fresh cases were 1,604 in Delhi, 643 in Mumbai, 159 in Kolkata, 4,532 in Bangalore and 1,223 in Chennai.
Meanwhile, China, which is hosting the 2022 Olympics in Beijing, detected 45 new cases of Covid-19 among Olympic Games-related personnel on February 4, up from 21 a day earlier, according to the organising committee. In the US, the coronavirus pandemic reached a grim new milestone with the nation’s cumulative death toll from Covid-19 surpassing 9,00,000, even as the daily number of lives lost has begun to level off, according to data collected by Reuters. The latest tally marks an increase of more than 1,00,000 US Covid-19 fatalities since December 12, coinciding with a surge of infections and hospitalisations driven by the highly contagious Omicron variant of the virus.
Fourteen more people died of coronavirus in Punjab on Saturday while 988 fresh cases took the infection tally to 7,51,246, according to a medical bulletin. Deaths were reported from several districts, including Amritsar, Ferozepur, Hoshiarpur and Jalandhar. The state's death toll stands at 17,408.
The number of active cases is 12,316.
Of the fresh cases, Ludhiana reported 183, followed by 139 in Mohali and 101 in Jalandhar. A total of 677 patients are on oxygen support while 66 critical patients are on ventilator support, as per the bulletin.
A total of 2,964 people recovered from the infection, taking the number of recoveries to 7,21,522, the bulletin said. (PTI)
The cumulative number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the country crossed 169 crore on Saturday, the Union health ministry said. More than 40 lakh vaccine doses were administered till 7 pm on Saturday, it said, adding that the daily vaccination tally is expected to go up with the compilation of the final reports by late night.
More than 1.46 crore (1,46,98,311) precaution doses have been administered to healthcare workers (HCWs), frontline workers (FLWs) and those aged 60 years and above, the ministry said.
The countrywide vaccination drive against the viral disease was rolled out on January 16 last year with the HCWs getting inoculated in the first phase. The vaccination of FLWs started from February 2 last year.
The next phase of Covid vaccination commenced from March 1 last year for people over 60 years of age and those aged 45 years and above with specified co-morbid conditions. (PTI)
Fresh Covid-19 infections in Tamil Nadu continued to decline as 7,524 cases in the last 24 hours were added to the caseload that stood at 34,04,762. There were 37 more fatalities and they took the death toll to 37,733, said the Health Department.
Recoveries eclipsed new cases with 23,938 people getting discharged in the last 24 hours, aggregating to 32,28,151 leaving 1,38,878 active infections, a bulletin said.
Chennai and Coimbatore accounted for the most of the new cases with 1,223 and 1,020 cases respectively. The rest were spread across other districts. Perambalur recorded the least with 17 cases getting reported. (PTI)
Karnataka on Saturday reported 12,009 fresh cases and 50 deaths. Bangalore reported 4,532 fresh cases.
Delhi on Saturday reported 1,604 fresh cases and 17 deaths. The city’s positivity rate is at 2.87% now.
West Bengal on Saturday reported 1,345 fresh cases and 31 more deaths. Kolkata recorded 159 fresh cases and 8 more deaths.
Mumbai reports 643 new cases and 1,402 patient discharges. The city now has 6,367 active cases.
Tripura logged 52 new Covid-19 cases on Saturday, 10 less than the previous day's figure, taking the tally to 1,00,637, a health department official said here.
One more coronavirus patient succumbed to the disease in the past 24 hours raising the death toll to 913.
Altogether 594 patients recovered from Covid-19 on Saturday. The total number of people who have been cured of the disease till now is 98,472. The North-eastern state currently has 1,184 active cases and 68 patients have migrated out.
A total of 3,412 samples were taken up for tests in the last 24 hours and 52 of them came out positive. The positivity rate now is 1.55 per cent, the official said. (PTI)
With schools gearing up to reopen for classes 9 to 12 from Monday, authorities have inoculated 82 per cent adolescents in Delhi with the first dose since the exercise to vaccinate them against coronavirus commenced from January 3.
According to official data, 8.33 lakh adolescents have received the first dose and 0.39 lakh have been jabbed with the second dose.
Delhi has around 10.14 lakh beneficiaries in the 15-18 age group.
According to officials, 95 per cent of government school students have been vaccinated, while 73 per cent students of aided school students have received at least one dose. Sixty-two per cent private school students have been inoculated with at least one dose.
The maximum number of adolescents have been inoculated with the first dose in southwest district at 1,12,521 followed by northwest at 10,87,99 and west at 84,958. (ANI)
Kerala continued to witness a dip in the daily COVID-19 infection rate for the third consecutive day, with the state reporting 33,538 new positive cases on Saturday taking the caseload to 62,44,654.
The health department said 46,813 persons recuperated from the disease today, taking the number of recoveries to 58,33,762. "Currently, there are 3,52,399 active COVID-19 cases in the state of which only three per cent of the patients are admitted to hospitals," it said.
Kerala had recorded 38,684 fresh infections yesterday and 42,677 COVID-19 cases on Thursday.
The state reported 444 COVID-19-related deaths on Saturday, taking the death toll to 57,740. (PTI)
The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) on Saturday requested Chief Justice of India N V Ramanatres that physical hearings in the apex court be reassumed to the pre-pandemic level as the COVID-19 situation is in control and stressed that 'open court hearing' is both the "convention and constitutional requirement".
In a letter addressed to the CJI, SCBA president Vikas Singh said the positivity rate in the national capital has come down to below four percent and the Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) has decided to reopen schools, colleges and gyms here with effect from February 7.
The apex court is presently hearing matters virtually after the number of COVID-19 cases started rising in December last year due to the Omicron variant of the virus.
The letter said due to the onset of the pandemic in March 2020, the apex court had started hearing matters virtually and from November 9 last year, it had commenced physical hearing on three days - Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday - in a week. (PTI)
The Centre has placed a purchase order with Biological E for five crore doses of Covid vaccine Corbevax each costing Rs 145 excluding taxes, official sources said on Saturday.
The government is yet to decide on which segment of beneficiaries this new vaccine would be administered.
However, according to sources, discussions are underway in technical groups and in the Health Ministry's immunisation division about expanding the scope of the precaution doses which are currently being given to healthcare and frontline workers, and comorbid senior citizens.
The HLL Lifecare Limited, a public sector undertaking, has issued the supply order of Corbevax to Biological E in January-end on behalf of the Union Health Ministry. (PTI)
Arunachal Pradesh reported 196 fresh COVID-19 cases, while 407 more patients recovered from the disease in the last 24 hours, a health department official said on Saturday.
The state's coronavirus tally rose to 63,315 with the single-day infections, and the recovery count stood at 61,039, he said.
The death toll remained at 291, as no new fatality was reported since Friday, State Surveillance Officer Lobsang Jampa said. (PTI)
Singapore has detected a record 13,208 COVID-19 infections and six new deaths, taking the total number of cases to 379,681 with 866 fatalities recorded in the country, the health ministry has said.
The number of locally transmitted COVID-19 infections tripled to 13,046 on Friday from 4,087 cases reported on Thursday. The cases reported on Friday included 162 people arriving here through the vaccinated travel lanes.
As for the Friday wave record, 10,312 cases were identified by antigen rapid tests and were assessed to have mild symptoms and are of low risk. The other 2,734 local cases were detected through polymerase chain reaction tests, said the Ministry of Health said in its daily virus update on its website.
Six deaths linked to COVID-19 complications were reported on Friday, it said. (PTI)
Odisha's COVID-19 tally rose to 12,64,705 on Saturday as 2,603 more people tested positive for the infection, while 22 fresh fatalities pushed the state's coronavirus death toll to 8,711, a health bulletin said.
It is the lowest single-day spike since January 6. The daily cases plunged by 46 per cent from 4,842 a week ago. The state had registered 2,697 cases and 23 fatalities on Friday.
The daily positivity rate slightly dipped to 4.13 per cent from 4.44 per cent on the previous day as 63,045 samples were tested for COVID-19 in the last 24 hours.
Khurda district reported the highest number of 444 cases, while 349 children were among the 2,603 new patients in the state. (PTI)
Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Saturday said though the active coronavirus cases in Pune have come down by nearly 50 per cent, the administration will adopt a wait and watch policy.
Pawar, who is also the guardian minister of Pune, was speaking to reporters after reviewing the COVID-19 situation in the district.
"As far as COVID-19 cases are concerned worldwide, there has been a decline in new infections, but there is a marginal increase in daily casualties. It has been observed at the district, state, national and global levels," the minister said.
Active cases have come down by 30 per cent in the country, while in state, they have declined by 42 per cent, he said. "There were 90,000 active cases in Pune district till last week, but the number has now come down to 45,000. Though the cases are declining, we will adopt a wait and watch policy for the next few days," Pawar said. (PTI)
Russia reported a record daily number of Covid-19 cases on Saturday as the Omicron coronavirus variant continued to spread, authorities said.
New daily cases jumped to 177,282, from 168,201 a day earlier. The government coronavirus task force also reported 714 deaths in the past 24 hours. (Reuters)
US health officials said they are considering lengthening the recommended interval between the first two doses of the most widely used Covid-19 vaccines to eight weeks to lower the risk of heart inflammation and improve their effectiveness.
Dr. Sara Oliver, an official at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said the agency was considering making the recommendation for Moderna and Pfizer /BioNTech shots during a meeting of the Advisory Committee on Immunisation Practices, a panel of outside advisers to the CDC.
In the United States, the recommended interval between the first two shots of Pfizer's vaccine is three weeks and for Moderna's, four. (Reuters)
Puducherry witnessed a dip in the number of daily Covid-19 cases on Saturday with only 344 new infections being reported, taking the aggregate to 1.63 lakh.
The fresh cases were identified at the end of examination of 2,254 samples. One more person from Puducherry succumbed to the deadly infection raising the toll to 1,947. Director of Health Sriramulu said in a release that the new cases were reported from Puducherry 224, Karaikal 74, Yanam 39 and Mahe 7.
The active cases were 4,630, of whom 114 were in hospitals today and the remaining 4,516 patients in home isolation. (PTI)
Propelled in part by the wildly contagious omicron variant, the US death toll from Covid-19 hit 9,00,000 on Friday, less than two months after eclipsing 8,00,000.
The two-year total, as compiled by Johns Hopkins University, is greater than the population of Indianapolis, San Francisco, or Charlotte, North Carolina. Just 64 per cent of the population is fully vaccinated, or about 212 million Americans, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
New cases per day have plunged by almost a half-million since mid-January, when they hit a record-shattering peak of more than 800,000. Cases have been declining in 49 states in the last two weeks, by Johns Hopkins' count, and the 50th, Maine, reported that confirmed infections are falling there, too, dropping sharply over the past week. (AP)