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Pandemic pushes Chinese tech giants to roll out more courier robots
Researchers at the University of Michigan said fully and partially automated vehicles could cut delivery costs by 10−40% in cities. Alibaba’s last-mile logistics vehicle has delivered over a million orders as of September to more than 200,000 consumers, the company said. It operates over 200 robots and plans to have 1,000 by March and 10,000 over the next three years.
World Bank says Delta variant slowing economic growth in East Asia and Pacific
Economic activity began to slow in the second quarter of 2021, and growth forecasts have been downgraded for most countries in the region, according to the World Bank’s East Asia and Pacific Fall 2021 Economic Update.
While China’s economy is projected to expand by 8.5%, the rest of the region is forecast to grow at 2.5%, nearly 2 percentage points less than forecast in April 2021, the World Bank said.
With 12,899 new COVID-19 cases, India’s tally reaches 1,07,90,183
According to the Union Ministry, the total number of active COVID-19 cases stands at 1,55,025. As many as 44,49,552 people have been administered the COVID-19 vaccine so far, as per the Health Ministry.
There are 4,000 variants of virus that causes COVID-19, UK minister says
Its very unlikely that the current vaccine won’t be effective on the variants whether in Kent or other variants especially when it comes to severe illness and hospitalisation
“All manufacturers, Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna, Oxford-AstraZeneca and others are looking at how they can improve their vaccine to make sure that we are ready for any variant – there are about 4,000 variants around the world of COVID now.”UK Vaccine Deployment Minister Nadhim Zahawi told Sky News,”
Majority of companies expect COVID-19 to continue impacting their business next year:Aon Survey
Rory Moloney, Chief Executive Officer, Global Risk Consulting, Aon, said: “There is no question that the COVID-19 pandemic will permanently change the way companies operate. There is a long way to go before we are in the ‘post-COVID era’, but as we move towards a recovery phase, companies must now ask what risk management and resilience should look like going forward. Among the top priorities for companies seeking to reshape their business are the new and accelerated use of technology, redeploying resources, workforce planning and rethinking the future of work—this is only the beginning of a much more long-term evolution in risk management.”
Over 300 million Indians may have COVID-19 – source citing government study
Separate tests done on more than 700,000 people across India by diagnostics company Thyrocare Technologies showed 55% of the population may have already been infected, its chief told Reuters last week.
The World Health Organization says at least 60% to 70% of a population needs to have immunity to break the chain of transmission.
Over half in New Delhi may have had COVID, government survey suggests
“In the fifth sero survey done in the national capital of Delhi, (coronavirus) antibodies have been detected in 56.13% of the city’s population,” Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain said on Twitter after the report was published.
No data generated with Covishield, Covaxin on ”European” strain of coronavirus, Rajya Sabha told
To a question on whether the Covishield and Covaxin are able to provide protection from the new coronavirus variant that was traced in the UK, Union Minister Ashwini Choubey told Rajya Sabha, “At present, there is no data generated with the above vaccines specifically on new European COVID-19 virus strain.”
Scientists fear COVID-19 UK variant has mutated again
Tests conducted on samples of the Kent variant, named after the region in England where it was first detected, show a mutation, called ‘E484K’, already detected in the South Africa and Brazil variants. There are fears that this mutation could evade the immune system and that the vaccines currently being administered may prove less effective against these further mutating variants of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
Coronavirus can be controlled, WHO Chief says, pointing to decrease in number of new cases
On Friday, the WHO chief warned against coronavirus vaccine hoarding, saying it could lead to slow global economic recovery and most importantly a never-ending pandemic.
Since the start of the pandemic last year, more than 103 million coronavirus cases have been confirmed worldwide, with over 2.2 million fatalities, according to Johns Hopkins University.
India showing a declining trend of Covid-19 cases since last four months, says government
The government’s strategy of focusing on testing, contact tracing, isolation and quarantine-containment is the fundamental approach for managing infectious disease outbreaks of epidemic or pandemic in nature, Minister of State for Health Ashwini Choubey said, adding that the strategy has been recommended globally and by the World Health Organisation for suppressing transmission or breaking the cycle of transmission of Covid-19.
Health sector hails increased allocation, new schemes
The Finance Minister announced that Rs 64,180 crore will be invested over six years to improve primary, secondary and tertiary healthcare.
“Her focus on improving rural and urban health infrastructure in addition to the existing National Health Mission will certainly see many new initiatives coming up, which will help improve the health index of people in the country. Spending on improving supply of potable water through Jal Jeevan Mission too will improve health of citizens across India,” Mervin Leo, Cluster COO, Gleneagles Global Hospitals, told IANS. .