Heena Sharma Blog

The Health Ministry on Tuesday issued guidelines that have been formed for the management of dead bodies infected with novel coronavirus (Covid-19) to define a set of protocols in handling such cases. In a press briefing, Joint Secretary, Health Ministry Lav Aggarwal gave details about these. Guidelines for dead body management towards precautions, infection prevention and control measures, handling of body and environmental disinfection have been formed. Lav Aggarwal also said that all tests for coronavirus at private laboratories should be offered when prescribed by a qualified physician according to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) guidelines. "Private labs testing is to ensure real time reporting to Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP) and the ICMR," he said. Read More

The government on Tuesday banned the entry of passengers from Afghanistan, Philippines and Malaysia to India with immediate effect, according to an additional travel advisory. In continuation of the travel advisory issued on March 11 and March 16, the following additional advisory has been issued. ALSO READ: Coronavirus LIVE: 64-year-old dies in Mumbai, India Covid-19 toll reaches 3 "Travel of passengers from Afghanistan, Philippines and Malaysia to India is prohibited with immediate effect," it said. No flight shall take off from these countries to India after 1500 hours Indian Standard Time (IST). The airline shall enforce this at the port of initial departure, according to the advisory. This instruction is a temporary measure and shall be in force till March 31 and will be reviewed subsequently. Read More

With the coronavirus reaching tech parks, campuses of multinational companies and even schools and colleges in Bengaluru, the IT city is gearing up to shoot the trouble with the help of technology. The city has so far reported four positive coronavirus cases . As more employees opt for work from home in this time of crisis, start-ups are launching a suite of products to support collaboration and communication among workers. Ozonetel, a city-based start-up, for example, has rolled out a cloud-based solution for call centre companies to switch to work-from-home, in order to contain the spread of the virus. Using the solution, a company can route calls to mobile phones or even landlines, instead of them taking calls via desktop. Human resource management software start-up Kredily has started providing its attendance management app for free to companies. Unlike a contact-based biometric system, the web-based authentication system rules out the possibility of spreading the virus th...

The death toll from a coronavirus outbreak in mainland China rose to 1,868 as of the end of Monday, up by 98 from the previous day, the National Health Commission said on Tuesday. The central Hubei province, the epicentre of the outbreak, reported 93 deaths, while in the provincial capital of Wuhan, 72 people died. Across mainland China, there were 1,886 new confirmed infections on Monday, bringing the total so far to 72,436. Read More

Three persons with a travel history to China have been kept under observation at an isolation ward of the RML Hospital here for a possible exposure to novel coronavirus , officials said on Tuesday. The three -- all men aged between 24 and 48 -- were admitted on Monday and their samples have been sent for testing to ICMR-NIV Pune laboratory, Dr Minakshi Bhardwaj, Medical Superintendent of RML Hospital, said. While two of the men are residents of Delhi, one hails from NCR. All the three patients have respiratory problems like cold and cough along with fever and they self-reported at the designated health facility to deal with such cases. According to Bhardwaj, two of the patients had returned from China about a week ago while the other about a month back. Till Monday, a total of 33,552 passengers arriving in India from China in 155 flights have been screened As per data received on Jan 14, total 17 samples have been received by the ICMR-NIV Pune Lab, out of which 14 have...