Heena Sharma Blog

India’s tally of Covid-19 -positive cases has reached 9,240 and the number of fatalities currently stands at 331. The country has so far tested 179,374 samples (as on 11 April) — implying 4.7 per cent of the samples tested have been found to be positive for Covid-19 . India is constantly upgrading its testing capabilities to keep a check on the spread of coronavirus infections in the country. The number of tests conducted has grown almost four times since April 1 to an average 15,000 daily in the past five days. In Tamil Nadu, 9.8 per cent of the 9,842 tests conducted gave coronavirus-positive results, the highest ratio among all states and Union Territories of India. It was followed by Delhi and Chandigarh, where 9.1 and 7.2 per cent of the tests yielded positive results, respectively. Among other major states, Rajasthan and Kerala have lower infection-to-test conducted ratios, at 2.8 and 2.6, respectively. Read More

Transporters are finding it difficult to streamline the supply chain of essential goods with only 15 per cent of trucks plying on the road amid the 21-day nationwide lockdown to control the coronavirus pandemic , the All India Motor Transport Congress (AIMTC) has said. AIMTC, the apex body of transporters in the country, both cargo and passenger, represents around 10 million truckers and 5.5 million tourist buses and operators. "We have approximately 1.25 million trucks with national permit. But during the period of lockdown, only 200,000 to 250,000 trucks with national permits are on road," news agency ANI quoted AIMTC President Kultaran Singh Atwal as saying. Read More

At a time when there is a spurt in the number of Covid-19 cases in India, most hospitals are also running short of ventilators which are absolutely necessary to help the infected continue breathing. According to several estimates, the country has only around 50,000 ventilators for a population of around 1.3 billion people. A Bengaluru-based deep-tech start-up, Ethereal Machines, is addressing the problem to some extent by enabling the existing ventilators to cater to the different requirements of multiple patients, depending upon their criticality. The Blume Ventures-backed firm, which specialises in technologies associated with computerised numerical control (CNC) machining and 3D printing, has come up with an innovation to augment the capacities of existing ventilators, in dire circumstances. Simple 3D printed splitters that divide the supply of oxygen into two halves have been tried out successfully in Europe. “India is seeing a massive shortage of ventilators and manufac

A 70-year-old COVID-19 patient died in Gujarat's Bhavnagar district early Thursday morning, a health department officials said. With this, the total number of deaths due to coronavirus inthe state has gone up to three, they said. "The 70-year-old man died at a government hospital in Bhavnagar," state principal secretary (health) Jayanti Ravi said. Earlier, one patient each from Ahmedabad and Surat had succumbed to the viral infection, she said. Four new COVID-19 cases have been reported in Lucknow, taking the total tally of coronavirus cases in the state to above 40 on Thursday. Read More

Taking precautionary steps in the light of the Corona pandemic , the government has relaxed the requirement of holding board meetings with physical presence of directors for activities including approval of financial statements and the board’s report. The Corporate Affairs Ministry has issued a notification to allow companies to hold such board meetings through video conferencing till June 30. Companies will have to follow all requirements laid out under rules for holding board meetings via video conferencing such as recording of these proceedings, ensuring availability of proper equipment among others. Existing company rules do not allow certain matters to be dealt with in a meeting through video conferencing or other audio-visual means. These include, the approval of the prospectus, annual financial statements, Board’s report, matters relating to amalgamation, merger, demerger, acquisition and takeover and the Audit Committee Meetings for consideration of accounts. Read Mor

Normally bustling century-old Chinatowns from Melbourne to San Francisco have fallen quiet and businesses are struggling to survive as fears over the deadly novel coronavirus outbreak ripple around the world. "Scaremongering is rampant" complains Max Huang, owner of the Juicy Bao restaurant in Melbourne's historic Chinese district. "Customers won't come in if they can avoid it." Huang's eatery sits among dozens of restaurants making up Australia's oldest Chinatown enclave, dating back to the influx of fortune-seekers during an 1850s gold rush. Although the epicentre of the COVID-19 epidemic is more than a ten-hour-flight way, and Australia has seen just a handful of cases, the stigma of a disease that has claimed more than 1,500 lives is pervasive. Streets are notably quieter, facemasks are a commonplace and even a Lunar New Year dragon dance failed to bring in the usual crowds. Read More

The Congress on Tuesday released its manifesto for the Lok Sabha polls, making a slew of promises, including giving Rs 72,000 each to five crore poor families under the 'Nyay' scheme, filling up 2.2 million government vacancies, bringing a separate budget for farmers and fixing a single moderate GST rate. The 55-page document titled ' Hum Nibhayenge ' (We will deliver) focused on addressing the issues of joblessness, farm distress, safety of women and boosting the rural economy, with stress on building a narrative on "real issues" faced by people. The manifesto was released by party president Rahul Gandhi, former prime minister Manmohan Singh, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi and senior leader P Chidambaram among others. For farmers, Congress promised to put them on the path from "Karz Maafi" (loan waiver), to "Karz Mukti" (freedom from loans). This will be done through remunerative prices, lower input costs, and assured access to

With 90 per cent of gravely wounded security personnel succumbing to injuries within a few hours, DRDO 's medical laboratory has come up with a range of 'combat casualty drugs' that can extend the golden hour till the trooper is shifted to hospital. The spectrum includes bleeding wound sealants, super absorptive dressings and glycerated salines, all of which can save lives in the event of warfare in jungle and high altitude areas as well as in terror attacks, scientists said. Citing the February 14 terror attack in Pulwama where 40 CRPF soldiers were killed, they said the medicines could have brought down the death toll. According to developers of the drugs at the Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Allied Sciences, a laboratory of the Defence Research and Development Organisation, chances of survival and minimum disability are highest when effective first aid care is given within the golden hour. Scientists at INMAS, entrusted with research and development in a

At the Partner's Forum on maternal and child health held in the capital on Wednesday, prime minister Narendra Modi said 500,000 patients had received treatment under the Ayushman Bharat scheme in the first ten weeks after the launch. The government has approved claims worth Rs 7 billion, the prime minister said. The Ayushman Bharat scheme was launched in September to provide cashless treatment for 500 million citizens. Modi added, "Officers have been asked to identify 117 'aspirational districts'. Each such district has been entrusted to a team that works across sectors like education, water and sanitation, rural development with top-most priority to health and nutrition." The government's vaccination programme has reached 32.8 million children and 8.4 million pregnant women in the last three years. Vaccines for 12 life-threatening diseases like pneumonia and diarrhoea are provided under the Mission Indradhanush vaccination programme. Read More

This is Zora . It may not look like much — more cute toy than futuristic marvel — but this robot is at the center of an experiment in France to change care for elderly patients. When Zora arrived at this nursing facility an hour outside Paris, a strange thing began happening: Many patients developed an emotional attachment, treating it like a baby, holding and cooing, giving it kisses on the head. Zora, which can cost up to $18,000, offered companionship in a place where life can be lonely. Families can visit only so much, and staff members are stretched. Patients at the hospital, called Jouarre, have dementia and other conditions that require round-the-clock care. The nurse at Jouarre who oversees Zora controls the robot from a laptop. He often stands out of view so patients don’t know it’s him at the controls. The robot can have a conversation because the nurse types words into a laptop for the robot to speak. Some patients refer to Zora as “she,” other

Practicing yoga regularly can enable governments and individual households save on healthcare costs, Union Minister for Commerce and Industry Suresh Prabhu said here on Monday. Speaking at the inaugural session of a two-day international yoga conference, Prabhu said that yoga helps provide the right balance between providing good healthcare without burdening individual households or governments. "If you do yoga regularly, it will prevent diseases, it will make life better with almost no cost. The governments will not be burdened with costs, nor households will have to face the big challenge of how to provide hospitalization to the family members," the Minister said. "This is a great opportunity of bringing yoga as an answer to many problems that the global world is facing." Read Complete Article Business Standard

Scientists have developed an artificial intelligence (AI) system that can better predict the risk of death in patients with heart disease than human experts. In a study published in the journal PLOS One, researchers showed how the AI could revolutionise healthcare. "It won't be long before doctors are routinely using these sorts of tools in the clinic to make better diagnoses and prognoses, which can help them decide the best ways to care for their patients," said Andrew Steele, from the Francis Crick Institute in the UK. "Doctors already use computer-based tools to work out whether a patient is at risk of heart disease, and machine-learning will allow more accurate models to be developed for a wider range of conditions," said Steele. The model was designed using the electronic health data of over 80,000 patients, collected as part of routine care. Scientists, including those from the University College London in the UK, wanted to see if they