The Karnataka government has extended the COVID-19 lockdown till June 21
India reported 91,702 new COVID-19 cases and 3,403 new deaths today. The country vaccinated 32,74,672 in the last 24 hours, taking the total vaccination to 2,46,085,649.
Here are the top 10 updates on coronavirus in India:
India's test positivity rate (positive cases identified for every 100 tests) continues to decline. It stands at 4.48 per cent, the fourth straight day that it is below the 5 per cent-mark.
Tamil Nadu reported 16,813 infections, followed by Kerala (14,424) Maharashtra (12,207) and Karnataka (11,042).
The Karnataka government has extended the COVID-19 lockdown in the state by a week, till June 21, while relaxing some curbs in districts with positivity rates under 15 per cent.
Tamil Nadu is among the bottom five states in terms of vaccinating its population against coronavirus. So far, the state has inoculated only nine per cent of its seven-crore population with the first dose of the vaccine. This has put the state right at the bottom of the list of states with low vaccination percentage along with UP, Assam, Bihar and Jharkhand.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi held meetings for well over five hours yesterday reviewing select ministries and the work done by them during the Covid crisis. The ministries, seven in all, made brief presentations on various decisions taken by them, sources in the government said.
Doctors from AIIMS, and members from the national taskforce on COVID-19, have said that mass, indiscriminate and incomplete vaccination can trigger emergence of mutant strains and recommended that there is no need to inoculate those who had documented coronavirus infection.
UK and Indian scientists have jointly developed a low-cost sensor that can detect fragments of the virus responsible for COVID-19 within wastewater, paving the way for health officials to get a better understanding of how prevalent the disease is in a larger area.
After kicking up a storm with his comments on the efficacy of allopathic drugs against COVID-19, yoga guru Ramdev, in a U-turn, said he will soon get the jab and described doctors as "God's envoys on earth".
The CoWIN system used for registering people for COVID-19 vaccination is completely secure and reports of the system being hacked "appear to be fake", the government said in a statement on Thursday.
One of the most effective ways to help the poor recover from the crippling economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic is to increase the number of work days under the government's flagship jobs scheme from 100 to 150 days, Nobel laureate Abhijit Banerjee has told NDTV.
