Heena Sharma Blog

  Maharashtra has emerged as the leader in the COVID-19 vaccination drive as it has administered vaccine doses to 43,42,646 people, an official said on Thursday. The state surpassed Rajasthan in the vaccination drive on March 24, he said. Rajasthan now ranks second as it has vaccinated 43,27,874 people, the official said. "Maharashtra tops the list of states in the country in terms of the number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered," Dr Pradeep Vyas, principal secretary of Maharashtra Public Health Department, said. The state has also administered the second dose of vaccine to 6,72,128 people, thereby reaching the cumulative vaccination figure of 50,14,774. "Maharashtra is also the first state to cross the 50- lakh doses benchmark. We will further scale up the vaccination," he said. Read More

  Smartphone maker Realme on Wednesday said it expects to get 10-15 per cent share in the 4G handsets segment priced in the range of Rs 10,000-Rs 20,000 a unit with the launch of new 8 series devices. The company will have all devices above Rs 20,000 price range enabled with 5G technology. "With the launch of realme 8 series , we are aiming to penetrate deeper into the Rs 10,000 to Rs 20,000 mid-range 4G market, and capture the young users across the country. "We plan to increase our market share in this segment to 10-15 per cent with the launch of the 8 series," Realme Vice-President and Chief Executive Officer (India and Europe) Madhav Seth said on sidelines of launching the new series. The company unveiled two new models, Realme 8 Pro, first smartphone with 108 megapixel ultra-quad camera and Realme 8 with 64 MP AI quad camera. Read More

  Amid a rise in coronavirus cases , the Delhi Disaster Management Authority on Tuesday ordered that there will be no public celebrations in the national capital during upcoming festivals such Holi and Navaratri. Chief Secretary Vijay Dev directed authorities to ensure strict compliance of the order. "All authorities concerned will ensure that public celebrations and gatherings, congregations during upcoming festivals like Holi, Shab-e-Barat, Navaratri etc shall not be allowed in public places/public grounds/public parks/markets/religious places etc in NCT of Delhi," Dev said in the order. Delhi reported 1,101 COVID-19 cases on Tuesday, the highest in over three months, while four people succumbed to the disease, the health department said. It is for the first time since December 24 that the city has recorded more than 1,000 cases in a day. Read More  

  The union government's expert panel on new drugs and vaccines could meet later this week to consider granting emergency approval to Sputnik V, Russia's Covid-19 vaccine , a report in The Print said citing sources. Hyderabad-based drugmaker Dr. Reddy's Laboratories, which conducted the clinical trials for the vaccine, has submitted the immunogenicity data to the subject expert committee (SEC) of the Central Drugs Standards Control Organization (CDSCO), India's national regulatory body for pharmaceuticals and medical devices. Odisha might have to have to pause its coronavirus vaccination drive for a few days because of a shortage in doses, according to a report by Reuters. The state's additional chief secretary for health P.K. Mohapatra wrote to the central health ministry to say Odisha only had enough doses to run its vaccination drive until March 30. It is expecting another batch of Covishield only on April 2. “We will have no vaccines for 4 days,” Mohapatra sai...

  Genome sequencing by INSACOG showed coronavirus variants of concern and a novel variant in India, said government on Wednesday. The Indian SARS-CoV-2 Consortium on Genomics (INSACOG) is a grouping of 10 national laboratories that was established by Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Govt of India on December 25, 2020. INSACOG has since then been carrying out genomic sequencing and analysis of circulating Covid-19 viruses, and correlating epidemiological trends with genomic variants. "Genomic variants of various viruses are a natural phenomenon and are found in almost all countries," said Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in a statement. Since INSACOG initiated its work, 771 variants of concerns (VOCs) have been detected in a total of 10,787 positive samples shared by states/UTs. These include 736 samples positive for viruses of the UK (B.1.1.7) lineage. 34 samples were found positive for viruses of the South African (B.1.351) lineage. 1 sample was found positi...

  India recorded 47,262 fresh coronavirus cases in a day, the highest single-day rise so far this year, taking the nationwide COVID-19 tally to 1,17,34,058, the Union health ministry said on Wednesday. The active caseload registered an increased for the 14th day in row and was recorded at3,68,457, comprising 3.14per cent of the total infections, while the recovery rate further dropped to 95.49 per cent, the ministry data updated at 8 am said. The daily rise in infections was the highest recorded in 132 days, while the country's COVID-19 death toll increased to1,60,441, with 275 new fatalities, the highest in around 83 days. As many as47,905 new infections were recorded in a span of 24 hours on November 12 last year, it said. The number of people who have recuperated from the disease surged to 1,12,05,160, while the case fatality rate stands at 1.37 per cent, the data stated. Read More

  The overall number of global Covid-19 cases has surpassed 124 million, while the deaths have surged to more than 2.73 million, according to the Johns Hopkins University. In its latest update on Wednesday morning, the University's Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) revealed that the current global caseload and death toll stood at 124,124,997 and 2,733,380, respectively. The US is the worst-hit country with the world's highest number of cases and deaths at 29,920,561 and 543,793, respectively, according to the CSSE. Brazil follows in the second place with 12,130,019 cases and 298,676 fatalities. The other countries with more than 2 million confirmed coronavirus cases are India (11,686,796), Russia (4,424,595), France (4,373,607), the UK (4,321,006), Italy (3,419,616), Spain (3,234,319), Turkey (3,061,520), Germany (2,689,205), Colombia (2,347,224), Argentina (2,261,577), Mexico (2,203,041) and Poland (2,089,869), the CSSE figures showed. Read More