Coronavirus News Highlights: 'WHO's calculation method and data on Covid deaths in India incorrect'

India's daily Covid-19 cases on Tuesday dipped slightly as the nation logged 2,288 new coronavirus infections. Stay tuned for updates!

Over 190.65 crore Covid vaccine doses administered in India

The cumulative number of Covid-19vaccinedoses administered in the countrycrossed190.65 crore on Tuesday, the Union health ministry said.

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Madhya Pradesh logs 30 Covid-19 cases, no death; active tally now 200

The Covid-19 tally in Madhya Pradesh reached 10,41,747 on Tuesday after the detection of 30 cases, while there was no addition to the toll, which stood at 10,735, an official said. The positivity rate, or cases detected per 100 tests, was 0.5 per cent, while the recovery count increased by 29 to touch 10,30,812, leaving the state with 200 active cases

Gujarat sees 33 Covid-19 cases, no death; 12 recoveries leave active tally at 173

Gujarat on Tuesday reported 33 Covid-19 cases, which took the tally to 12,24,563, while the death toll remained unchanged at 10,944, a state health department official said. So far, 12,13,446 persons have been discharged post-recovery, including 12 during the day, leaving the state with an active caseload of 173, he said

Covid-infected Bangladesh all-rounder Shakib out of Sri Lanka Test

Bangladesh all-rounder Shakib Hasan tested positive for Covid-19 on Tuesday and was ruled out of this week's first Test against Sri Lanka, the country's cricket authorities said.

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Delhi records 1,118 new Covid cases, one more death; positivity rate stands at 4.38 pc: Authorities

WHO chief says China's zero-Covid policy not 'sustainable'

The head of the World Health Organization said on Tuesday China's zero-tolerance Covid-19 policy is not sustainable given what is known of the disease, in rare public comments by the UN agency on a government's handling of the virus.

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Anti-coronavirus offences push political crime to record in Germany

Offences by those opposed to Covid-19 restrictions drove politically motivated crimes in Germany to a record high last year, an Interior Ministry report showed on Tuesday.The number of politically motivated crimes jumped by more than 23% from the previous year to 55,048, the highest level since police started collecting the data in 2001.The increase was primarily due to a rise in "non-classic" politically-motivated offences, or crimes not directly associated with far-left or far-right politics, which accounted for almost 40% of crimes last year, the report showed.

WHO's calculation method and data on Covid-19 deaths in India is incorrect: Writer Priyam Gandhi-Mody

Texas doctor calls US Covid deaths nearing 1 million 'mindblowing'

In the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic, pulmonologist Joseph Varon offered an opinion that made headlines around the world and went viral on social media. He was fighting two wars, he said: one against Covid and one against stupidity.

As the United States nears the grim milestone of 1 millioncoronavirus-linked deaths, Varon, chief of critical care and Covid-19 at United Memorial Medical Center in Houston, Texas said only one of those battles has been won.

Shanghai disinfects homes, closes all subways in Covid fight

Teams in white protective suits are entering the homes ofcoronavirus-infected people to spray disinfectant as Shanghai tries to root out an omicron outbreak under China's strict “zero-Covid” strategy.

City official Jin Chen said Tuesday that in older communities with shared bathrooms and kitchens, the homes of anyone else who uses those facilities will also be disinfected. He tried to address public concern about damage to clothing and valuables, saying residents can inform the teams about anything that needs protection.

Helping employees do well in post-Covid era

The economy reopened after the Covid pandemic has created new and unforeseen hurdles in an economy that had already slowed down. The mental, physical, and emotional health of employees has been severely affected. Physical workspaces are not accessible, and employees have to adjust to the new ways of work.

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Luxury brands navigate Shanghai's lockdown to keep VIPs pampered

What Ms. Zhang didn't expect when she hunkered down for Shanghai's citywide lockdown was complementary ready meals and desserts from luxury brands such as Louis Vuitton and Cartier to start arriving the very next day.

Since the Covid-19 containment began on April 1, closing stores and paralysing online shopping, brands have overcome attendant delivery difficulties to gift provisions to "very important clients" (VICs) like 24-year-old entrepreneur Zhang.

Though not high-value gifts, the effort to keep in touch has "impressed and surprised us," said Zhang, who wanted to be identified by surname only citing privacy.

Shanghai has seen some of the strictest containment measures worldwide, with residents forbidden from leaving apartments in blocks where COVID-19 cases have been found, while some buildings and even entire streets have been fenced off.

With supermarkets shuttered and logistics chains upended, residents have struggled to buy food. Government provisions aimed at filling gaps have been delivered sporadically, with reports of mixed quality from district to district.

Helping out, many companies have delivered provisions to employees. For the more wealthy, banks and high-end hotels have joined luxury brands in sending out goodies - a privilege not unnoticed on social media.

Authorities in Shanghai have again tightened anti-virus restrictions, just as the city was emerging from a month of strict lockdown due to a Covid-19 outbreak.

Notices issued in several districts said residents were ordered to stay home and are barred from receiving nonessential deliveries as part of a “quiet period” lasting at least until Wednesday.

The tightened measures could be extended depending on the results of mass testing, the notices said.

For many people worldwide, having cotton swabs thrust up their nose or down their throat to test for Covid-19 has become a routine and familiar annoyance.

But two years into the pandemic, health officials in some countries are questioning the merits of repeated, mass testing when it comes to containing infections, particularly considering the billions it costs.

Chief among them is Denmark, which championed one of the world's most prolific Covid testing regimes early on. Lawmakers are now demanding a close study of whether that policy was effective.

"We've tested so much more than other countries that we might have overdone it," said Jens Lundgren, professor of infectious diseases at Rigshospitalet, University of Copenhagen, and member of the government's Covid advisory group.

Japan avoided large-scale testing and yet weathered the pandemic relatively well, based on infection and death rates. Other countries, including Britain and Spain, have scaled back testing.

China's tough zero-Covid measures remain essential to defeat the pandemic and buy time to improve vaccination rates and develop new treatments, senior health advisers wrote in recently published reports.

Shanghai, a city of 25 million people, has been locked down for nearly six weeks as it battles China's biggest coronavirus outbreak, but the government have shrugged off criticism of its zero-COVID strategy, saying it remains the best option.

In correspondence published by the peer-reviewed medical journal the Lancet last Friday, a team of city medical experts said Shanghai's vital role in the national economy made lockdown unavoidable.

"As a leading economic centre and an open city in China, Shanghai has huge exchanges with other cities and regions in the country, so the spill-out of virus to other places... could have unimaginably severe consequences," said the team, which includes Zhang Wenhong, an adviser to authorities in Shanghai on treatment for Covid-19.

Oil prices tumbling more than 1% on Tuesday, extending the previous day's steep declines as coronavirus lockdowns in top oil importer China, a strong dollar and growing recession risks fed worries about the outlook for global demand.

Slain photojournalist Danish Siddiqui is among four Indians honoured with the prestigious Pulitzer Prize 2022 in the feature photography category.

Siddiqui and his colleagues Adnan Abidi, Sanna Irshad Mattoo and Amit Dave from the Reuters news agency won the award, announced on Monday, for "images of COVID’s toll in India that balanced intimacy and devastation, while offering viewers a heightened sense of place", according to The Pulitzer Prizes website.

Their work was moved from the breaking news photography category by the judges.

Siddiqui, 38, was on assignment in Afghanistan last year when he died. The award-winning journalist was killed in July last while covering clashes between Afghan troops and the Taliban in Spin Boldak district of Kandahar city.

India's daily Covid-19 cases on Tuesday dipped slightly as the nation logged 2,288 new coronavirus infections, taking the total tally of Covid-19 cases to 4,31,07,689, according to the Union Health Ministry data.

Covid-19: Sex workers in acute crisis

The lockdowns, this year and the last, have been devastating for sex workers

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Covid-19: UGC allows another extension for submission of M.Phil or Ph.D thesis

Universities and higher educational institutions can give another extension of up to six months beyond 30 June for M.Phil or Ph.D thesis submission on case-to-case basis after reviewing a student's work, an official of the University Grants Commission said on Monday.

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