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COVID-19: India records 22,065 infections, 354 fatalities

The number of people who have recuperated from the disease surged to 94,22,636 pushing the national recovery rate to 95.12 per cent, while the COVID-19 case fatality rate stood at 1.45 per cent

The active COVID-19 caseload remained below four lakh for the eighth consecutive day on Tuesday

There are 3,39,820 active coronavirus infections in the country which constitute 3.43per cent of the total caseload, the data stated

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Lloyd’s, Parsyl to insure emerging market COVID-19 vaccine rollout

The Global Health Risk Facility (GHRF), made up of 14 insurers and reinsurers, has been set up to address the challenges of transporting temperature-sensitive vaccines, and will be supported by $26.7 million in funding from the U.S International Development Finance Corporation, the companies said on Tuesday.

The DFC loan will be used to capitalize a new public-private Lloyd’s syndicate, which will start operating in January, and allow the GHRF to offer cost-effective insurance policies for shipments of vaccines and medical products to developing countries.

Syndicate 1796 is the first public-private partnership to address a global health emergency in Lloyd’s 330-year history, the companies said.

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SoftBank-backed India’s Ola to invest $326 million in electric-scooter plant

The Indian government has been pushing automakers to move to cleaner fuel technology, especially electric, in an effort to reduce its oil import bill and curb pollution in major cities.

While carmakers have been slow to launch electric vehicles (EVs), mainly due to the high cost of batteries and weak demand from buyers, sales of electric scooters and rickshaws have picked up pace and are leading India’s electrification drive.

The country needs an investment of over $180 billion in vehicle production and charging infrastructure until 2030 to meet its EV ambition, according to the CEEW Centre for Energy Finance (CEEW-CEF), an Asian think tank.

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Digital registration, allocating manufacturers: Guidelines for Covid-19 vaccination drive

The Covid-19 vaccine will be offered first to healthcare workers, frontline workers and to persons above 50 years of age, followed by persons younger than 50 years of age with associated comorbidities based on the evolving pandemic situation, and finally to the remaining population based on the disease epidemiology and vaccine availability.
At the vaccination site, only pre-registered beneficiaries will be vaccinated in accordance with the prioritisation, and there will be no provision for on-the-spot registrations.
Under phase one of the vaccination, it is planned to vaccinate nearly 30 crore population.

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‘New variant’ of coronavirus identified in Britain

“We’ve currently identified over 1,000 cases with this variant predominantly in the South of England although cases have been identified in nearly 60 different local authority areas.”We do not know the extent to which this is because of the new variant but no matter its cause we have to take swift and decisive action which unfortunately is absolutely essential to control this deadly disease while the vaccine is rolled out,”said Health Secretary Matt Hancock said

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Bacteria that travel across continents in atmospheric dust can impact climate & ecosystems

According to scientists, including those from the University of Granada (UGR) in Spain, these aerosols act like a “launch vehicle” for bacteria, and may pose risk of disease transmission across continents.

They explained that iberulites are giant atmospheric bioaerosols made of multiple minerals, measuring on average one hundred microns approximately.

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Next four to six months could be worst of Covid-19 pandemic: Bill Gates

“Overall, when I did the forecasts in 2015, I talked about the deaths potentially being higher. So, this virus could be more fatal than it is. We didn’t get the worst-case. But the thing that has surprised me is that the economic impact in the US and around the world has been much greater than the forecasts that I made five years ago,” Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates said.

Gates said that his foundation had been funding a lot of the research for the vaccines.

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