Group of Ministers on Covid-19 had detailed deliberation on the measures taken as on date by the Centre and various States/UTs for prevention, containment and management of COVID-19. GoM was informed that all districts have been asked to follow and further strengthen their contingency plans to combat COVID-19; the GOM was briefed on the state-wise details of dedicated COVID-19 hospitals along with the adequacy of isolation beds/wards, PPEs, N95 masks, drugs, ventilators, oxygen cylinders etc.The GoM was also informed that as of now, 5,062 people have been cured with a recovery rate of 20.66%. Since yesterday, an increase of 1429 new cases has been reported. Also, a total of 24,506 people have been confirmed positive for COVID-19.
Giving relaxation in the category of Commercial and private establishments, MHA has issued an order to all States/UTs, to allow opening of all shops registered under Shops & Establishment Act of respective States/ UTs, including shops in residential complexes, neighborhood & standalone shops.Shops in market complexes, except those within the limits of municipal corporations and municipalities, would be allowed to open. Shops in single & multi-brand malls would not be allowed to open anywhere.
Dr. Harsh Vardhan, Minister of Health and Family Welfare interacted with all the State Health Minister and Health Secretaries through a video conference to review the preparedness and actions taken for management of COVID-19. He thanked the States for their efforts so far and requested them to focus on districts reporting a higher number of cases or faster doubling rate of their cases and districts where high case mortality is being noted. He urged the States to focus on surveillance, house-to-house active case finding, early identification of cases and proper clinical management to ensure that the patients get timely treatment and mortality is reduced.
Union HRD Minister felicitated the team of scientists from IIT Delhi involved in the development of Probe-free COVID-19 detection assay. The testing kit will empower healthcare services and support government efforts to deal with Covid-19. This is the first probe-free assay for COVID-19 approved by ICMR and it will be useful for specific and affordable high throughput testing. This assay can be easily scaled up as it does not require fluorescent probes. The team is targeting large scale deployment of the kit at affordable prices with suitable industrial partners as soon as possible.
‘KisanRath’ mobile app turns big hit within a week of its launch: Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare had launched “KisanRath” App on 17.04.2020 to facilitate Farmers and Traders in identifying right mode of transportation for movement of farm produce ranging from food grain (cereal, coarse cereal, pulses etc), Fruits & Vegetables, oil seeds, spices, fiber crops, flowers, bamboo, log & minor forest produce, coconuts etc. Till date, total of 80,474 farmers and 70,581 traders are registered on this App.
Department of Posts to deliver essential items through National Road Transport Network with 22 routes of over 500km
Working on the idea of starting a road network with the existing fleet of departmental vehicles, primarily used for intra-city delivery, a National Road Transport Network has been designed with 22 long routes of over 500 km interspersed with 34 interstate/intra-state schedules touching over 75 cities across the country. This initiative will now ensure that there is a movement of essential items within the country as Department of Posts will be able to deliver parcels carrying essential items anywhere in the country.
