COVID-19 News Updates

The second worst hit country in terms of cases is India (42,962,953 infections and 515,036 deaths), followed by Brazil (29,056,525 infections and 652,438 deaths).

The Subject Expert Committee on COVID-19 of the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation had on Friday recommended giving permission for conducting a phase-3 clinical trial of the single-dose COVID-19 vaccine Sputnik Light as a booster dose.

The toll mounted to 9,101 with three fatalities in Kandhamal district. These are confirmed as Covid deaths after an audit. Fifty-three other coronavirus patients have died due to comorbidities so far, according to data.

With the administration of over 26.19 lakhs vaccine doses in the last 24 hours, India's Covid inoculation coverage has reached 178.83 crore as of Sunday morning. This has been achieved through 2,07,34,782 sessions.

The other countries with over 10 million cases are France (23,191,580), the UK (19,256,835), Russia (16,619,507), Germany (15,723,907), Turkey (14,326,217), Italy (12,990,223) and Spain (11,100,428), the CSSE figures showed.

The country has also administered over 2 crore precaution doses among the eligible beneficiaries. Additionally, over 97 per cent of India's adult population has also received their first dose of vaccine against Covid-19.

In a research note, India Ratings and Research (Ind-Ra) said it has maintained a neutral outlook for the Indian pharmaceutical sector for FY23.

The active cases comprise 0.17 per cent of the total infections, while the national COVID-19 recovery rate has further improved to 98.65 per cent, the ministry said.

The second worst hit country in terms of cases is India (42,951,556 infections and 514,589 deaths), followed by Brazil (28,978,052 infections and 651,522 deaths).

The next phase of COVID-19 vaccination commenced from March 1 for people over 60 years of age and those aged 45 and above with specified co-morbid conditions. The country launched vaccination for all people aged more than 45 years from April 1.

Of 19 antibodies, 17 were ineffective against the BA.2 subvariant. The researchers found that bebtelovimab, the latest monoclonal antibody to receive FDA Emergency Use Authorisation, is the only currently available antibody therapy that can adequately treat all three Omicron subvariants.

One of the proteins (ABO) that was identified as having a causal connection to the risk of developing severe COVID-19 determines blood groups, suggesting that blood groups play an instrumental role in whether people develop severe forms of the disease.

The recovery of 13,450 patients in the last 24 hours has increased the cumulative tally to 4,23,67,070.

US continues to be the worst-hit country with the world's highest number of cases and deaths at 79,196,200 and 956,262, according to the CSSE.

Meanwhile, the weekly positivity rate has come down to 0.99 per cent while daily positivity rate stands at 0.74 per cent.