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Coronavirus India Updates: Recording a slight dip in the new cases, India added 75,809 coronavirus cases Tuesday taking the country’s total caseload to over 42.80 lakh. Of the total cases, over 33 lakh people have recovered after testing positive while over 8.83 lakh infections still persist.
The daily cases dipped after recording over 80,000 new cases every day for the past 5 days and over 90,000 in the last two days. India, now the world’s second worst-affected nation, has added over 20 lakh cases from August 7 to September 5. (Follow Covid-19 LIVE updates here)
With 1,133 fresh fatalities, a record number of Covid-induced deaths were reported in the last 24 hours taking the country’s toll past 75,000 to reach 75,775. India’s recovery rate went up to 77.65 per cent while its fatality rate stood at 1.7 per cent, unchanged from the previous day.
The Ministry of Health has allowed a phased reopening of schools and colleges from September 21. In a recent notice, the ministry stated that skill or entrepreneurship training will be permitted from September 21. The ministry has also allowed the reopening of schools for class 9 to 12 on a “voluntary basis” from September 21.
The higher educational institutions conducting PhD or technical and professional programmes requiring laboratory or experimental works will be permitted too, however, the date will be finalised after a discussion between the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Home Affairs.
Colleges reopening will have to keep their equipment six feet apart, further, the institutes will have to make marks on the floor to ensure students and teachers are at the required distance. Institutes are asked to conduct classes in the “intermix” mode of regular classroom teaching and online teaching or assessments. Staggering of the classroom, no sharing of objects, separate timing slots, to allow for adequate physical distancing and disinfection of classroom premises are suggested by the Ministry of Health.
In wake of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the Karnataka government Tuesday decided to make the world-famous Mysore Dasara celebrations a low-key event this year.
In a high-level meeting attended by all three Deputy CMs, other ministers, and top government officials, Chief Minister Yediyurappa said: “It has been unanimously decided to hold the Dasara celebrations in Mysuru in a simple manner upholding the tradition. The popular food mela, Yuva Dasara, sports meet, and other cultural events will not take place this time to prevent people from gathering at the areas risking further spread of Covid-19.”
A key attraction of the festival, the Jumbo Savari— a grand procession of elephants carrying idols of deities including Sri Chamundeshwari from Mysuru Palace to Bannimantap Grounds — will also be restricted this time, Tourism Minister C T Ravi informed.
The death toll due to the novel coronavirus in Uttar Pradesh rose to 4,047 on Tuesday with 73 more fatalities, while 6,743 fresh cases pushed the state’s infection tally to over 2.78 lakh, PTI reported.
According to the latest bulletin issued by the UP government, of the 73 deaths, 19 were reported from Lucknow followed by six from Prayagraj and four from Kanpur.
Three deaths each were reported from Gorakhpur, Varanasi, Moradabad, Maharajganj, Unnao, and Rae Bareli among others, it said.
With 63,256 active cases, the total number of cases in the state have now climbed to 2,78,473.
The Delhi High Court Tuesday ordered that doctor’s prescription will not be mandatory from now on for those going voluntarily for RT/PCR test to detect COVID-19 infection in the national capital. Till now it was mandatory for a person to have a doctor’s prescription or symptoms to get tested for the virus.
A bench of justices Hima Kohli and Subramonium Prasad said people need to carry Aadhaar card for Delhi address proof and fill up a form as prescribed by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) for testing.
The court has also ordered the Delhi government to ramp up mobile testing facilities, at least four in each district.
Dr. VK Paul, Member (Health), Niti Aayog on Tuesday said that the vaccine developed by Russia has been under consideration.”The vaccine developed by Russia has been under consideration of the country. The government of Russia approached our govt and sought help on two counts- to consider its manufacturing through our network of companies, and phase 3 studies in India,” Dr. Paul was quoted as saying by ANI.
“The government of India attaches great importance to this offer of partnership from a very special friend of this nation, and on both the tracks there has been significant movement,” he further added.
Gujarat’s civic body reported four cases of Covid-19 reinfection between August 18 and September 6, nearly four months after the patients tested positive for the first time. The fours reinfections include two male resident doctors, a 26-year-old woman resident doctor and a 60-year-old homemaker. They had first tested positive between April 13 and April 21. All had subsequently recovered and were discharged after testing negative through RT PCR tests at the time.
AMC said these four are being considered as the statistically rare cases of reinfection, since two of them had coincidentally been included in the two serosurveys of AMC, and thus they have some evidence to track the trajectory of the supposed cases of reinfection.
As migrants return to Gujarat, Ahmedabad has started testing for Covid-19 at the railway station for arriving passengers. Of the over 1,800 passengers who arrived in three trains, 33 tested positive. In Rajkot, 15 employees of the Gujarat State Road Transport Corporation (GSRTC) tested positive.
At the Ahmedabad Kalupur railway station, of the 823 passengers who arrived via Delhi-Ahmedabad Rajdhani Express, 26 tested positive.
Seven others among the total of 1,050 arriving passengers, that is 519 passengers who arrived via Gorakhpur Express and 530 others via Muzaffarpur Express, tested positive.
The presence of “antibodies” in one’s immune system does not necessarily provide protection from the coronavirus infection, scientists have noted. The protection from reinfecting the disease rather depends on factors such as the nature, quantity and the lasting duration of antibodies in a person’s system. With coronavirus cases showing no signs of abating in the country, scientists are grappling with the vital issue of antibodies and trying to discern their role in curbing the virus.
Immunologist Satyajit Rath from the National Institute of Immunology said he would prefer to “wait and see” where the evidence goes and that antibody presence in itself tells us nothing about disease progression in individuals.
According to a scientist at Pune’s Indian Institute of Science, there are neutralising antibodies (nAbs) and also simple antibodies. While nAbs produced against the coronavirus can block its entry into the host cell, other antibodies are also generated against many parts of the virus. “The simple antibodies are an indication of host response to viral presence but are not that useful to stop further spread of the virus”, he added.
Senior Samajwadi Party leader and Member of Legislative Council SRS Yadav Monday night succumbed to the coronavirus after he tested positive on September 1. The 87-year-old was admitted at the Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences (SGPGI) following his test results, SP national spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary said.
SRS Yadav, who worked as an administrative officer till 1992, joined the Samajwadi Party after his retirement. He is survived by his wife and three sons.
Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav, while condoling the demise of the senior party colleague, said he dedicated his entire life to the Samajwadi Party after his retirement.
Punjab breached the 2,000-mark in a single day on Monday, as it recorded 2,110 fresh Covid-19 cases, taking the tally to 65,583 on Monday. The death toll from the infection mounted to 1,923 with 61 more fatalities. Before this, Punjab surpassed its previous single-day maximum of 1,946 cases registered on Sunday.
Maximum new cases of infections were once again from Ludhiana (338), followed by Jalandhar (210), Mohali (176), Amritsar (157). Meanwhile, six more police personnel tested positive in Ludhiana.
A total of 1,565 patients in the state were discharged after recovering from the infection. So far, 47,020 people have recovered while active cases stand at 16,640. Seventy-five critical patients are on ventilator support while 534 on oxygen support.
The Karnataka government Monday ordered a clinical study on reinfection cases, a day after a 27-year-old woman tested positive for coronavirus for the second time.
After a meeting held at Vidhana Soudha in the state capital, Medical Education Minister K Sudhakar said that officials have been directed to conduct a clinical study and submit a report by the end of this week.
The Minister also asked the officials to look into reinfection cases reported in other states.
Following the detection of nearly six lakh new infections in the week beginning August 31, the Centre has over the last few days made a significant change in targeting its messaging on tackling the novel coronavirus.
The Centre has begun to communicate directly with the administrative and chief medical officers fighting the pandemic. Receiving feedback from these officers, the Centre has identified several loopholes in the implementation of containment, surveillance and clinical management strategies for the coronavirus in several states.
According to sources, these lapses gave the push to the country’s rising numbers.