India's daily rise in Covid cases remained below the 1 lakh-mark for eight straight day with 60,471 new infections. After health infrastructure was strained by the second Covid wave, states are taking strong measures in anticipation of a third wave.
The country's daily Covid cases hit record high on May 7 when 4.14 lakh infections were reported. Today's daily rise is the lowest since March 31. The positivity rate stood at 3.45 per cent. 2.95 crore total cases have reported so far and over 3.7 lakh people have died; 2,726 people died since yesterday.
Novavax's COVID-19 vaccine is more than 90 per cent effective, including against coronavirus variants, the vaccine maker said Monday after a large-scale US study.
The jab "demonstrated 100% protection against moderate and severe disease, 90.4% efficacy overall," the company said in a statement, adding "the study enrolled 29,960 participants across 119 sites in the U.S. and Mexico to evaluate efficacy, safety and immunogenicity."
The Maryland-headquartered company said it intended to apply for regulatory approval by the third quarter of 2021, AFP.
Meanwhile, people infected with COVID-19's delta variant, first detected in India, are more than twice as likely to end up in the hospital than with the alpha variant identified in the U.K. last year.
Vaccines from Pfizer Inc. and AstraZeneca Plc protect against delta, researchers said Monday. They found the shot made by Pfizer and partner BioNTech SE offered better protection in a large study from Scotland, Bloomberg reported.
Schools, colleges and educational institutions will remain shut.
Here are the Live Updates on India Coronavirus (Covid-19 Cases) Cases:
The supply price of Bharat Biotech's COVID-19 vaccine Covaxin to the central government at Rs 150 per dose is not sustainable in the long run, the vaccine maker said on Tuesday.
The centre's supplying price is pushing the pricing structure for the private sector upward.
"Fundamental business reasons ranging from low procurement volumes, high distribution costs and retail margins among few others contribute to higher pricing of Covaxin," Bharat Biotech said justifying the higher price when compared to other COVID-19 vaccines available for the private sector in India.
A government report has, for the first time, acknowledged one death in India due to vaccination.
A 68-year-old man, fully vaccinated, died on March 31 and it has been labelled as "vaccine product related reaction" in a report assessing 31 severe cases reported since the government launched the vaccine drive in January.
The report is by the National Adverse Events Following Immunization (AEFI) committee under the Union Health Ministry. Of the 31 cases, 28 are deaths.The highly transmissible Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 has mutated further to form the 'Delta plus' or 'AY.1' variant but there is no immediate cause for concern in India as its incidence in the country is still low, scientists said.
The new Delta plus variant has been formed due to a mutation in the Delta or B.1.617.2 variant, first identified in India and one of the drivers of the deadly second wave. Though there is no indication yet of the severity of the disease due to the new variant, Delta plus is resistant to the monoclonal antibody cocktail treatment for COVID-19 recently authorised in India.
"One of the emerging variants is B.1.617.2.1 also known as AY.1 characterized by the acquisition of K417N mutation," Vinod Scaria, clinician and scientist at Delhi's CSIR-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (IGIB), tweeted on Sunday.
Two hospitals in Delhi will start administering the Russian COVID-19 vaccine Sputnik V by the end of this week, reported ANI.
"Delhi's Madhukar Rainbow Children's Hospital will start administering Russia's COVID-19 vaccine Sputnik V tentatively by June 20. The appointment slots can be booked via CoWIN portal," hospital officials told ANI.
Andhra Pradesh has so far reported 2,303 cases of black fungus or mucormycosis, while 157 people have died due to the disease, said the State Medical and Health Principal Secretary Anil Kumar Singhal.
Addressing the media, Mr Singhal said, "As many as 2,303 black fungus cases have been reported to date in Andhra, out of which 1,328 cases are active cases. So far 157 have died of black fungus. Amphotericin injection and Posaconazole tablets are adequately available all over the state."
He also informed that the Andhra Pradesh government announced a compensation of Rs 25 lakh each and Rs 20 lakh each for families of doctors and nurses respectively from the state health department who died of COVID-19.
Brazil registered 827 more deaths from COVID-19 in the past 24 hours, bringing the nationwide tally to 488,228, the health ministry said Monday.
A total of 39,846 new infections were detected, raising the nationwide caseload to 17,452,612, the ministry said.
Brazil has the world's second highest COVID-19 death count, after the United States, and the third largest caseload, following the United States and India.
