Indian Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Saturday said that 1,65,714 beneficiaries inoculated with COVID-19 vaccines till 5.30 pm across India on the first day.

A total of 16,755 vaccinators were also involved in the process across India, it said, adding that no case of post-vaccination hospitalisation was reported.

"Serum Institute of India produced COVISHIELD was supplied to all States/UTs, while Bharat Biotech's COVAXIN was supplied to 12 States. Total 3351 sessions held across the country with both the vaccines."

The government also said that COVID-19 vaccination drive was successful on Day 1. No case of post-vaccination hospitalisation reported so far.

"Since it was the first day of vaccination, a few issues came up- delay in uploading beneficiary list at some session sites and healthcare workers vaccinated though not scheduled for today's session," the government clarified in its press briefing. Resolutions provided for both the issues, it added.

The Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) had earlier this month approved Oxford COVID-19 vaccine Covishield, manufactured by the Serum Institute, and indigenously developed Covaxin of Bharat Biotech for restricted emergency use in the country.

(With inputs from agencies)

Indian Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Saturday said that 1,65,714 beneficiaries inoculated with COVID-19 vaccines till 5.30 pm across India on the first day.

Indian Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on Saturday said that 1,65,714 beneficiaries inoculated with COVID-19 vaccines till 5.30 pm across India on the first day. A total of 16,755 vaccinators were also involved in the process across India, it said, adding that no case of post-vaccination hospitalisation was reported. "Serum Institute of India produced COVISHIELD was supplied to all States/UTs, while Bharat Biotech's COVAXIN was supplied to 12 States. Total 3351 sessions held across the country with both the vaccines." The government also said that COVID-19 vaccination drive was successful on Day 1. No case of post-vaccination hospitalisation reported so far. "Since it was the first day of vaccination, a few issues came up- delay in uploading beneficiary list at some session sites and healthcare workers vaccinated though not scheduled for today's session," the government clarified in its press briefing. Resolutions provided for both the issues, it added. The Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) had earlier this month approved Oxford COVID-19 vaccine Covishield, manufactured by the Serum Institute, and indigenously developed Covaxin of Bharat Biotech for restricted emergency use in the country. (With inputs from agencies)

Coronavirus in India: 165,714 people vaccinated today, says health ministry

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the world's biggest coronavirus vaccine programme on Saturday virtually in New Delhi.

On day one, around 300,000 people will receive the first of two doses of the vaccine.

PM Modi exhorted Indians to keep following the Covid guidelines even though the vaccine roll-out does offer a glimmer of hope.&nbsp;'Dawaai bhi aur kadaai bhi' (vaccine along with the mandatory restrictions and strictness) was the motto of Modi's nationally televised address on Saturday morning.

The prime minister said, "Everyone was waiting for this day with bated breath. Everyone kept asking when the vaccine would come. It’s here and in a short span of time. In some minutes from now, the world’s biggest vaccination drive is to begin. It's a testimony to our scientists' talent and skills."

India, home to 1.3 billion people, has the world's second-largest caseload, and the government has given approvals to two vaccines -- though one is yet to complete clinical trials -- aiming to inoculate around 300 million people by July.

Emphasising the enormity of the vaccination drive, which he launched through a remote control amid chanting of Sanskrit shloka that meant 'let everybody be happy, let everybody be healthy', Modi said never before in history, has this type of a large-scale vaccination campaign been undertaken.

He said, "Such a big vaccination drive hasn’t ever been conducted in history. Look at the figures in the first phase -- 3 crore. We have to take it to 30 crore in the second phase. The United States, China and India are the only three countries in the world with a population of over 30 crore. The vaccination drive in India, by that measure, is so huge."

"India's vaccines enjoy global credibility because of their track record. Scientists and experts are satisfied with the safety of Made in India vaccines. That's why they have approved it. Citizens should hence stay away from propaganda, misinformation and rumours," the prime minister&nbsp;advised his countrymen.

"I want to remind people of the country that two doses of the vaccine are very important. Don't commit the mistake that you take one dose and forget the second one. As experts have been saying, there will be a gap of about one month between the two doses," Modi said.

PM Modi got overwhelmed with emotions as he remembered the ones India lost due to Covid-19, and were not accorded a proper farewell owing to the restrictions on movement.

In a choked voice, the Prime Minister also referred to sacrifices made by healthcare and frontline workers, hundreds of whom lost their lives to the viral infection.

He said, "Covid-19 kept people away from their families. Mothers cried for their children and had to stay away. People could not meet their elderly admitted at hospitals. We could not bid adieu to those with proper rituals who died due to coronavirus."

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The Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) had earlier this month approved Oxford COVID-19 vaccine Covishield, manufactured by the Serum Institute, and indigenously developed Covaxin of Bharat Biotech for restricted emergency use in the country, paving the way for the massive inoculation drive.

On January 30, the first case of coronavirus was found in India, but even more than two weeks before that India had formed a high level committee, he said.

The country had issued its first advisory on January 17 and India was among first few nations that started screening at airports, Modi said emphasising the speed at which India acted to deal with the pandemic.

Modi also talked about evacuation of Indians stuck abroad, saying that at a time when many countries of the world had left their citizens stranded in China, India evacuated not only Indians but citizens of other countries.

The prime minister congratulated the countrymen for passing the challenge of discipline and patience during the 'Janata Curfew' in March.

He pointed out that the exercise prepared the country psychologically for the lockdown. Morale of the country was kept high with the campaigns like 'taali-thali' and lighting of diyas, the prime minister added.

Delhi's Sulochna Kataria, a&nbsp;healthcare worker for 30 years,&nbsp;would be the first person to get vaccinated in India under the massive programme.

Meanwhile, India's Covid&nbsp;caseload on Saturday climbed to 1,05,42,841 with 15,158 more people testing positive for the disease while recoveries surged to 1,01,79,715. The&nbsp;death toll increased to 1,52,093 with 175 more fatalities.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the world's biggest coronavirus vaccine programme on Saturday virtually in New Delhi. On day one, around 300,000 people will receive the first of two doses of the vaccine.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the world's biggest coronavirus vaccine programme on Saturday virtually in New Delhi. On day one, around 300,000 people will receive the first of two doses of the vaccine. PM Modi exhorted Indians to keep following the Covid guidelines even though the vaccine roll-out does offer a glimmer of hope. 'Dawaai bhi aur kadaai bhi' (vaccine along with the mandatory restrictions and strictness) was the motto of Modi's nationally televised address on Saturday morning. The prime minister said, "Everyone was waiting for this day with bated breath. Everyone kept asking when the vaccine would come. It’s here and in a short span of time. In some minutes from now, the world’s biggest vaccination drive is to begin. It's a testimony to our scientists' talent and skills." India, home to 1.3 billion people, has the world's second-largest caseload, and the government has given approvals to two vaccines -- though one is yet to complete clinical trials -- aiming to inoculate around 300 million people by July. Emphasising the enormity of the vaccination drive, which he launched through a remote control amid chanting of Sanskrit shloka that meant 'let everybody be happy, let everybody be healthy', Modi said never before in history, has this type of a large-scale vaccination campaign been undertaken. He said, "Such a big vaccination drive hasn’t ever been conducted in history. Look at the figures in the first phase -- 3 crore. We have to take it to 30 crore in the second phase. The United States, China and India are the only three countries in the world with a population of over 30 crore. The vaccination drive in India, by that measure, is so huge." "India's vaccines enjoy global credibility because of their track record. Scientists and experts are satisfied with the safety of Made in India vaccines. That's why they have approved it. Citizens should hence stay away from propaganda, misinformation and rumours," the prime minister advised his countrymen. "I want to remind people of the country that two doses of the vaccine are very important. Don't commit the mistake that you take one dose and forget the second one. As experts have been saying, there will be a gap of about one month between the two doses," Modi said. PM Modi got overwhelmed with emotions as he remembered the ones India lost due to Covid-19, and were not accorded a proper farewell owing to the restrictions on movement. In a choked voice, the Prime Minister also referred to sacrifices made by healthcare and frontline workers, hundreds of whom lost their lives to the viral infection. He said, "Covid-19 kept people away from their families. Mothers cried for their children and had to stay away. People could not meet their elderly admitted at hospitals. We could not bid adieu to those with proper rituals who died due to coronavirus." #WATCH | PM Narendra Modi gets emotional while talking about the hardships faced by healthcare and frontline workers during the pandemic. pic.twitter.com/B0YQsqtSgW — ANI (@ANI) January 16, 2021 × The Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) had earlier this month approved Oxford COVID-19 vaccine Covishield, manufactured by the Serum Institute, and indigenously developed Covaxin of Bharat Biotech for restricted emergency use in the country, paving the way for the massive inoculation drive. On January 30, the first case of coronavirus was found in India, but even more than two weeks before that India had formed a high level committee, he said. The country had issued its first advisory on January 17 and India was among first few nations that started screening at airports, Modi said emphasising the speed at which India acted to deal with the pandemic. Modi also talked about evacuation of Indians stuck abroad, saying that at a time when many countries of the world had left their citizens stranded in China, India evacuated not only Indians but citizens of other countries. The prime minister congratulated the countrymen for passing the challenge of discipline and patience during the 'Janata Curfew' in March. He pointed out that the exercise prepared the country psychologically for the lockdown. Morale of the country was kept high with the campaigns like 'taali-thali' and lighting of diyas, the prime minister added. Delhi's Sulochna Kataria, a healthcare worker for 30 years, would be the first person to get vaccinated in India under the massive programme. Meanwhile, India's Covid caseload on Saturday climbed to 1,05,42,841 with 15,158 more people testing positive for the disease while recoveries surged to 1,01,79,715. The death toll increased to 1,52,093 with 175 more fatalities.

Indian PM Modi launches world's 'largest coronavirus vaccine drive'

WASHINGTON — Joe Biden is inheriting an economic crisis as he assumes the presidency, just as he did when he became vice president a dozen years ago. But this crisis is different and, to the relief of many liberal economists, so is Biden’s response.

The $1.9 trillion economic rescue package that Biden proposed Thursday is significantly larger and more targeted toward the economy’s biggest problems than the stimulus he and President Barack Obama pushed through in 2009. It is not intended to generate enough consumer spending to jolt the nation into a rapid recovery, like a traditional stimulus would in a more normal recession.

It is meant instead to resuscitate economic activity by more aggressively attacking the COVID-19 pandemic through vaccines and testing, and to sustain hard-hit people and businesses until that job is done.

There are other updates to match the shifting politics of the last decade. The package is filled with easy-to-explain provisions, like direct payments to individuals and government subsidies for child care, that could prove more immediately popular with voters than the often-hidden tax cuts included in the 2009 stimulus. This irks some economists and budget experts, who complain that the $1,400 checks, in particular, are an inefficient use of government resources.

Those complaints do not bother Biden and his aides. The Great Recession and its plodding recovery, combined with more than a decade of historically low government borrowing costs and diminishing concerns about a ballooning federal budget deficit in Washington, convinced them that it is better to spend too much on recovery than not enough.

“Every aspect of this plan shows that Biden has learned the lesson from 2009,” said Jason Furman, a former top economist for Obama: “Go big, be explicit, expand what people think is possible.”

Biden’s economic team includes several Obama-era veterans who say they have learned from the last 12 years and the economic and health struggles of the pandemic.

“This plan reflects an assessment of the current economic moment, and when you do that, you end up with a plan that is quite different than prior recessions,” said Brian Deese, who is Biden’s choice to lead the National Economic Council and held several policy roles in the Obama White House.

“If we want to get people back to work, we have to get schools open. If we want to have schools open, we need testing,” Deese said in an interview. He added that “if we want to create a bridge to when the economy is recovering, then we need to provide significant quantities of direct relief. Those are different issues than we saw in 2009.”

Those differences can be seen clearly in large parts of Biden’s new proposal that would not be considered stimulative in any traditional sense of the word.

Its centerpiece is more than $400 billion in spending to fortify the nation’s defenses against the coronavirus. That includes accelerating vaccine deployment and ramping up testing and contact tracing for infections, partly through a federal jobs program that would hire 100,000 people in those areas.

Paul Romer, the Nobel Prize-winning economist from New York University who has urged lawmakers to significantly increase their spending on testing, said Biden’s call to put $50 billion toward testing efforts “would make a huge difference” to the economy. Such an investment, he said, “would probably get us to the point where it is actually true that for the next 12 months, anyone who wants to get tested really can get tested.”

The COVID-19 funding also includes more than $100 billion for safety measures in schools, with a goal of reopening most kindergarten-to-eighth-grade schools within 100 days. If that succeeded, it would help potentially millions of parents, largely women, return to full-time work.

The other $1.5 trillion in the package is meant to help individuals, governments and, to a lesser degree, businesses that have taken the brunt of the damage since the pandemic recession began last year. It includes expanded and extended benefits for unemployed workers, aid for renters facing eviction and help for low-income families facing food shortages.

The plan also mandates — and funds — paid leave for most workers and provides new help for people who lack or have lost health insurance. The $1,400 direct checks are meant to help people who lost hours or income amid the crisis, although they will go to a far wider group that includes people who have not suffered financially in the crisis.

Biden has stressed that such aid will support increased consumer spending, but he and his team cast the goal of distributing the money in more human terms: to ensure as many Americans as possible avoid the scarring damage of homelessness, hunger and the virus itself.

The Biden team and its allies are confident that, if they succeed, the economy will be poised for a roaring rebound. Other policymakers and forecasters, including Jerome Powell, the Federal Reserve chair, have predicted a swift rebound once the virus is under control.

“The recovery from the Great Recession was delayed by years because we failed to act at the scale of the problem,” said Heidi Shierholz, a former Labor Department chief economist who is now at the liberal Economic Policy Institute. “This is a huge break from past mistakes.”

The Biden plan is not, to be clear, the exact plan that many economists, including liberal ones like Furman, would have chosen. The direct checks, which proved a winning political message in the Georgia runoff elections that gave Democrats control of the Senate, will reach millions of Americans who have not lost income amid the pandemic and are most likely to sock the money away in savings.

And its price tag, along with the inclusion of provisions that conservatives have long fought, like increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour, means the package is unlikely to draw much Republican support. Already, lawmakers are warning that it spends too much and is overkill on top of the $900 billion and $2.2 trillion packages passed in December and March.

Some conservative economists say the package spends far more than is necessary to fill what economists call the “output gap,” which is essentially the value of lost performance in the economy because of the recession. They are beginning to warn that pouring too much fuel on the economy risks runaway inflation — the same argument that many made in 2009 and that proved to be wrong.

“A package this size is inadvisable,” said Michael Strain, an economist at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “It would fill the output gap several times over.”

Some on the left say the plan still does not go far enough. Mark Paul, an economist at the New College of Florida, who estimated last month that the economy needed as much as $4 trillion to fully recover, said that Biden risked Congress refusing to pass more aid if it was needed in the fall.

Biden’s aides say they proposed a package intended to meet the needs of this crisis, having learned from the struggles of the early vaccine rollout and the failure of policymakers to fully bridge people and businesses through months of dampened economic activity as the pandemic raged. They were encouraged to spend as much as they proposed, in part, by the low interest rates and historically anemic inflation that have persisted for more than a decade, which have brought about a change in many economists’ thinking about the advisability of big deficits.

The proposal earned praise Friday from a Federal Reserve official who has urged lawmakers to spend more to help the economy escape the crisis. “It is a big package, but I think it’s appropriate,” Eric Rosengren, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, said in an interview on CNBC. “The economy is in a lull right now.”

Many lawmakers have changed their tune on deficits, too. Republicans downplayed deficit concerns while passing President Donald Trump’s signature tax cut package in 2017, and Trump signed trillions of dollars in economic aid packages into law last year, all of which were financed with borrowed money.

In 2009, after a campaign in which Obama had decried rising deficits under President George W. Bush, the Obama team limited its stimulus plans to less than $1 trillion, in part because they feared many Democrats would not go for more. Biden may yet have to scale back his ambitions to unify Democrats in the House and Senate, but even the most conservative members of his party are far more deficit-tolerant today than a decade ago.

“Whatever the combination is of lessons learned, new consensus on fiscal policy or the breadth of the pandemic, there is no question that the need to go big when you can is ingrained in nearly everyone on Team Biden and Democrats broadly right now,” said Gene Sperling, a former National Economic Council director for Obama who advised Biden in the campaign.

WASHINGTON — Joe Biden is inheriting an economic crisis as he assumes the presidency, just as he did when he became vice president a dozen years ago. But this crisis is different and, to the relief of many liberal economists, so is Biden’s response.

WASHINGTON — Joe Biden is inheriting an economic crisis as he assumes the presidency, just as he did when he became vice president a dozen years ago. But this crisis is different and, to the relief of many liberal economists, so is Biden’s response. The $1.9 trillion economic rescue package that Biden proposed Thursday is significantly larger and more targeted toward the economy’s biggest problems than the stimulus he and President Barack Obama pushed through in 2009. It is not intended to generate enough consumer spending to jolt the nation into a rapid recovery, like a traditional stimulus would in a more normal recession. It is meant instead to resuscitate economic activity by more aggressively attacking the COVID-19 pandemic through vaccines and testing, and to sustain hard-hit people and businesses until that job is done. There are other updates to match the shifting politics of the last decade. The package is filled with easy-to-explain provisions, like direct payments to individuals and government subsidies for child care, that could prove more immediately popular with voters than the often-hidden tax cuts included in the 2009 stimulus. This irks some economists and budget experts, who complain that the $1,400 checks, in particular, are an inefficient use of government resources. Those complaints do not bother Biden and his aides. The Great Recession and its plodding recovery, combined with more than a decade of historically low government borrowing costs and diminishing concerns about a ballooning federal budget deficit in Washington, convinced them that it is better to spend too much on recovery than not enough. “Every aspect of this plan shows that Biden has learned the lesson from 2009,” said Jason Furman, a former top economist for Obama: “Go big, be explicit, expand what people think is possible.” Biden’s economic team includes several Obama-era veterans who say they have learned from the last 12 years and the economic and health struggles of the pandemic. “This plan reflects an assessment of the current economic moment, and when you do that, you end up with a plan that is quite different than prior recessions,” said Brian Deese, who is Biden’s choice to lead the National Economic Council and held several policy roles in the Obama White House. “If we want to get people back to work, we have to get schools open. If we want to have schools open, we need testing,” Deese said in an interview. He added that “if we want to create a bridge to when the economy is recovering, then we need to provide significant quantities of direct relief. Those are different issues than we saw in 2009.” Those differences can be seen clearly in large parts of Biden’s new proposal that would not be considered stimulative in any traditional sense of the word. Its centerpiece is more than $400 billion in spending to fortify the nation’s defenses against the coronavirus. That includes accelerating vaccine deployment and ramping up testing and contact tracing for infections, partly through a federal jobs program that would hire 100,000 people in those areas. Paul Romer, the Nobel Prize-winning economist from New York University who has urged lawmakers to significantly increase their spending on testing, said Biden’s call to put $50 billion toward testing efforts “would make a huge difference” to the economy. Such an investment, he said, “would probably get us to the point where it is actually true that for the next 12 months, anyone who wants to get tested really can get tested.” The COVID-19 funding also includes more than $100 billion for safety measures in schools, with a goal of reopening most kindergarten-to-eighth-grade schools within 100 days. If that succeeded, it would help potentially millions of parents, largely women, return to full-time work. The other $1.5 trillion in the package is meant to help individuals, governments and, to a lesser degree, businesses that have taken the brunt of the damage since the pandemic recession began last year. It includes expanded and extended benefits for unemployed workers, aid for renters facing eviction and help for low-income families facing food shortages. The plan also mandates — and funds — paid leave for most workers and provides new help for people who lack or have lost health insurance. The $1,400 direct checks are meant to help people who lost hours or income amid the crisis, although they will go to a far wider group that includes people who have not suffered financially in the crisis. Biden has stressed that such aid will support increased consumer spending, but he and his team cast the goal of distributing the money in more human terms: to ensure as many Americans as possible avoid the scarring damage of homelessness, hunger and the virus itself. The Biden team and its allies are confident that, if they succeed, the economy will be poised for a roaring rebound. Other policymakers and forecasters, including Jerome Powell, the Federal Reserve chair, have predicted a swift rebound once the virus is under control. “The recovery from the Great Recession was delayed by years because we failed to act at the scale of the problem,” said Heidi Shierholz, a former Labor Department chief economist who is now at the liberal Economic Policy Institute. “This is a huge break from past mistakes.” The Biden plan is not, to be clear, the exact plan that many economists, including liberal ones like Furman, would have chosen. The direct checks, which proved a winning political message in the Georgia runoff elections that gave Democrats control of the Senate, will reach millions of Americans who have not lost income amid the pandemic and are most likely to sock the money away in savings. And its price tag, along with the inclusion of provisions that conservatives have long fought, like increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour, means the package is unlikely to draw much Republican support. Already, lawmakers are warning that it spends too much and is overkill on top of the $900 billion and $2.2 trillion packages passed in December and March. Some conservative economists say the package spends far more than is necessary to fill what economists call the “output gap,” which is essentially the value of lost performance in the economy because of the recession. They are beginning to warn that pouring too much fuel on the economy risks runaway inflation — the same argument that many made in 2009 and that proved to be wrong. “A package this size is inadvisable,” said Michael Strain, an economist at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “It would fill the output gap several times over.” Some on the left say the plan still does not go far enough. Mark Paul, an economist at the New College of Florida, who estimated last month that the economy needed as much as $4 trillion to fully recover, said that Biden risked Congress refusing to pass more aid if it was needed in the fall. Biden’s aides say they proposed a package intended to meet the needs of this crisis, having learned from the struggles of the early vaccine rollout and the failure of policymakers to fully bridge people and businesses through months of dampened economic activity as the pandemic raged. They were encouraged to spend as much as they proposed, in part, by the low interest rates and historically anemic inflation that have persisted for more than a decade, which have brought about a change in many economists’ thinking about the advisability of big deficits. The proposal earned praise Friday from a Federal Reserve official who has urged lawmakers to spend more to help the economy escape the crisis. “It is a big package, but I think it’s appropriate,” Eric Rosengren, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, said in an interview on CNBC. “The economy is in a lull right now.” Many lawmakers have changed their tune on deficits, too. Republicans downplayed deficit concerns while passing President Donald Trump’s signature tax cut package in 2017, and Trump signed trillions of dollars in economic aid packages into law last year, all of which were financed with borrowed money. In 2009, after a campaign in which Obama had decried rising deficits under President George W. Bush, the Obama team limited its stimulus plans to less than $1 trillion, in part because they feared many Democrats would not go for more. Biden may yet have to scale back his ambitions to unify Democrats in the House and Senate, but even the most conservative members of his party are far more deficit-tolerant today than a decade ago. “Whatever the combination is of lessons learned, new consensus on fiscal policy or the breadth of the pandemic, there is no question that the need to go big when you can is ingrained in nearly everyone on Team Biden and Democrats broadly right now,” said Gene Sperling, a former National Economic Council director for Obama who advised Biden in the campaign.

A second economic crisis for Biden, but a different first response

The foreign ministers of India and Nepal sat for the sixth round of a joint commission meeting in Delhi on Friday. The meeting saw a key focus being on Covid vaccine, the border issue, and connectivity.

The Indian side assured that Nepal's requirement will be a priority consideration. This happened on a day when Nepal approved India's Covishield vaccine produced by the Serum Institute of India.&nbsp;

Nepal wants 20 per cent or around 12 million doses of Covid vaccines from India.

A release by India's Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said, "The close cooperation between the two sides in combating Covid-19 pandemic in the region was noted. Nepal congratulated India on the remarkable success in production of Covishield and Covaxin vaccines in India and requested for early provision of vaccines to Nepal."

The meet -- which was chaired by Nepal's foreign minister Pradeep Gyawali and external affairs minister Dr S Jaishankar -- saw a discussion on the border issues as well.&nbsp;

Nepal had notably issued a new map of the country that showed Indian territories of Lipulekh, Kalapani and Limpiyadhura as their territories drawing the ire of New Delhi which dismissed this as "unjustified cartographic assertion".

Nepali foreign minister speaking at a public event in Delhi, to this end, had said, "We desire to start the conversation with a view to resolving the question of boundary alignment in the remaining segments."

"Finding an agreeable boundary alignment in these segments may not only take us to the stage of fully settled international boundary but may also help generate positive vibe in public sentiment as well as help instill greater degree of trust and confidence in bilateral relations," he added.

The two sides also discussed a new oil pipeline on the eastern side connecting Siliguri to Jhapa in Nepal and a possible Raxaul-Kathmandu broad gauge railway line. Both sides welcomed the commencement of construction of third Integrated Check Posts at Nepalgunj.

On the Pancheshwar hydropower project, Nepali FM said, "Our recent conversation on this transformative mega project has been encouraging. Once realised, Pancheshwar will not only be a big project on its own but also set a success story of how we can make arrangements for cost and benefit sharing in harnessing of our vast water resources."

The talks happened in the backdrop of the political crisis in the country with Nepal Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli dissolving the lower house of the Parliament. The country goes to the election later this year.&nbsp;

The foreign ministers of India and Nepal sat for the sixth round of a joint commission meeting in Delhi on Friday. The meeting saw a key focus being on Covid vaccine, the border issue, and connectivity.

The foreign ministers of India and Nepal sat for the sixth round of a joint commission meeting in Delhi on Friday. The meeting saw a key focus being on Covid vaccine, the border issue, and connectivity. The Indian side assured that Nepal's requirement will be a priority consideration. This happened on a day when Nepal approved India's Covishield vaccine produced by the Serum Institute of India. Nepal wants 20 per cent or around 12 million doses of Covid vaccines from India. A release by India's Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said, "The close cooperation between the two sides in combating Covid-19 pandemic in the region was noted. Nepal congratulated India on the remarkable success in production of Covishield and Covaxin vaccines in India and requested for early provision of vaccines to Nepal." The meet -- which was chaired by Nepal's foreign minister Pradeep Gyawali and external affairs minister Dr S Jaishankar -- saw a discussion on the border issues as well. Nepal had notably issued a new map of the country that showed Indian territories of Lipulekh, Kalapani and Limpiyadhura as their territories drawing the ire of New Delhi which dismissed this as "unjustified cartographic assertion". Nepali foreign minister speaking at a public event in Delhi, to this end, had said, "We desire to start the conversation with a view to resolving the question of boundary alignment in the remaining segments." "Finding an agreeable boundary alignment in these segments may not only take us to the stage of fully settled international boundary but may also help generate positive vibe in public sentiment as well as help instill greater degree of trust and confidence in bilateral relations," he added. The two sides also discussed a new oil pipeline on the eastern side connecting Siliguri to Jhapa in Nepal and a possible Raxaul-Kathmandu broad gauge railway line. Both sides welcomed the commencement of construction of third Integrated Check Posts at Nepalgunj. On the Pancheshwar hydropower project, Nepali FM said, "Our recent conversation on this transformative mega project has been encouraging. Once realised, Pancheshwar will not only be a big project on its own but also set a success story of how we can make arrangements for cost and benefit sharing in harnessing of our vast water resources." The talks happened in the backdrop of the political crisis in the country with Nepal Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli dissolving the lower house of the Parliament. The country goes to the election later this year.

Covid vaccine, border issue discussed during India-Nepal talks in Delhi

US President-elect Joe Biden has announced he would surge federal resources into making "thousands" of vaccine sites.&nbsp;

Biden has said he wants 100 million Americans to receive injections during his first 100 days in office, a drastic increase from the current pace. To this end, he has also deployed mobile clinics and expanded the public health workforce to accelerate the rollout of Covid-19 shots.

"This is going to be one of the most challenging operational efforts ever undertaken by our country. But you have my word: we will manage the hell out of this operation," he said on Friday.

The afternoon address came a day after he unveiled a $1.9 trillion stimulus package for the battered economy that included $20 billion for vaccines and $50 billion for testing.

Reports hence say Biden's plan would drastically increase the role of the federal government in the distribution effort, mobilising the Federal Emergency Management Administration and reimbursing states that deploy their National Guard.

Biden has also asked Congress to fund the expansion of the nation's public health workforce to 100,000 personnel, nearly triple the current number.

The push comes as the incoming leader was seeking to wrest the focus from the impeachment of Donald Trump to the agenda for his first days in office.

More than 388,000 people in the United States have lost their lives to the virus, a figure that is likely to have crossed 400,000 by the time Biden is sworn into office on Wednesday.

The outlook is set to worsen as the B.1.1.7 variant of the coronavirus establishes itself in the US as the dominant strain in March.

The Trump administration has already moved to release second doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines that were being held in reserve, and is recommending to states to begin vaccinating everyone over the age of 65.

Biden's plan would continue that policy, while also seeking to improve coordination with states by providing "actionable data on vaccine allocation timelines and delivery."

The Biden team also said they would invoke the Defense Production Act in order to boost supply, pay special attention to ethnic minority communities disproportionately impacted by the pandemic, and embark on an education campaign to build vaccine confidence.

(with inputs)

US President-elect Joe Biden has announced he would surge federal resources into making "thousands" of vaccine sites. Biden has said he wants 100 million Americans to receive injections during his first 100 days in office, a drastic increase from the current pace.

US President-elect Joe Biden has announced he would surge federal resources into making "thousands" of vaccine sites. Biden has said he wants 100 million Americans to receive injections during his first 100 days in office, a drastic increase from the current pace. To this end, he has also deployed mobile clinics and expanded the public health workforce to accelerate the rollout of Covid-19 shots. "This is going to be one of the most challenging operational efforts ever undertaken by our country. But you have my word: we will manage the hell out of this operation," he said on Friday. The afternoon address came a day after he unveiled a $1.9 trillion stimulus package for the battered economy that included $20 billion for vaccines and $50 billion for testing. Reports hence say Biden's plan would drastically increase the role of the federal government in the distribution effort, mobilising the Federal Emergency Management Administration and reimbursing states that deploy their National Guard. Biden has also asked Congress to fund the expansion of the nation's public health workforce to 100,000 personnel, nearly triple the current number. The push comes as the incoming leader was seeking to wrest the focus from the impeachment of Donald Trump to the agenda for his first days in office. More than 388,000 people in the United States have lost their lives to the virus, a figure that is likely to have crossed 400,000 by the time Biden is sworn into office on Wednesday. The outlook is set to worsen as the B.1.1.7 variant of the coronavirus establishes itself in the US as the dominant strain in March. The Trump administration has already moved to release second doses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines that were being held in reserve, and is recommending to states to begin vaccinating everyone over the age of 65. Biden's plan would continue that policy, while also seeking to improve coordination with states by providing "actionable data on vaccine allocation timelines and delivery." The Biden team also said they would invoke the Defense Production Act in order to boost supply, pay special attention to ethnic minority communities disproportionately impacted by the pandemic, and embark on an education campaign to build vaccine confidence. (with inputs)

Biden's Covid vaccination plan: 100 million shots in 100 days

Nepal foreign minister Pradeep Kumar Gyawali will be on a 3-day India visit from tomorrow with a focus on procuring COVID vaccines from India. Nepal wants 20% or around 12 million doses of Covid vaccines from India. He will be meeting India's external affairs minister Dr S Jaishankar as part of the 6th Nepal-India joint commission meet for which the invite was extended last year.

A release by Nepal foreign ministry, "The Joint Commission Meeting will discuss the whole gamut of Nepal-India bilateral relations, including trade, transit, energy, boundary, COVID-19 cooperation, infrastructure, connectivity, investment, agriculture, tourism, culture, among others."

The joint commission meeting, which alternates between the 2 countries, takes place in New Delhi this year. The Fifth Joint Commission Meeting was held in August 2019 in Kathmandu with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar visiting the country. The Nepali delegation will consist of the Nepali envoy to India, Foreign Secretary, Health Secretary, and other senior officials of the Government of Nepal.

Last year saw 3 high-level visits from Delhi to Nepal. These include the visit of India's intelligence chief, followed by the Indian army chief, and then by the visit of the foreign secretary.

This is the first high-level visit from Kathmandu in over a year and comes in the backdrop of India Nepal row over the new map issued by the Oli government. The new Nepali map showed Indian territories of Lipulekh, Kalapani and Limpiyadhura as Nepali territories drawing the ire of New Delhi which dismissed the "Unjustified Cartographic Assertion'. He will be the first foreign minister to visit Delhi this year.

While the map row did impact the political ties, the focus on people to people relations continued. India has been involved in a number of projects in the country and plans to operationalize Jayanagar-Kurtha cross-border rail line. Earlier both countries inaugurated the Motihari–Amlekhgunj petroleum pipeline, the first cross country pipeline in south Asia. The pipeline can carry two million metric tonnes of petroleum products into Nepal and so far has led to a saving of over 800 million Nepali rupees.

Nepal foreign minister Pradeep Kumar Gyawali will be on a 3-day India visit from tomorrow with a focus on procuring COVID vaccines from India. Nepal wants 20% or around 12 million doses of Covid vaccines from India.

Nepal foreign minister Pradeep Kumar Gyawali will be on a 3-day India visit from tomorrow with a focus on procuring COVID vaccines from India. Nepal wants 20% or around 12 million doses of Covid vaccines from India. He will be meeting India's external affairs minister Dr S Jaishankar as part of the 6th Nepal-India joint commission meet for which the invite was extended last year. A release by Nepal foreign ministry, "The Joint Commission Meeting will discuss the whole gamut of Nepal-India bilateral relations, including trade, transit, energy, boundary, COVID-19 cooperation, infrastructure, connectivity, investment, agriculture, tourism, culture, among others." The joint commission meeting, which alternates between the 2 countries, takes place in New Delhi this year. The Fifth Joint Commission Meeting was held in August 2019 in Kathmandu with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar visiting the country. The Nepali delegation will consist of the Nepali envoy to India, Foreign Secretary, Health Secretary, and other senior officials of the Government of Nepal. Last year saw 3 high-level visits from Delhi to Nepal. These include the visit of India's intelligence chief, followed by the Indian army chief, and then by the visit of the foreign secretary. This is the first high-level visit from Kathmandu in over a year and comes in the backdrop of India Nepal row over the new map issued by the Oli government. The new Nepali map showed Indian territories of Lipulekh, Kalapani and Limpiyadhura as Nepali territories drawing the ire of New Delhi which dismissed the "Unjustified Cartographic Assertion'. He will be the first foreign minister to visit Delhi this year. While the map row did impact the political ties, the focus on people to people relations continued. India has been involved in a number of projects in the country and plans to operationalize Jayanagar-Kurtha cross-border rail line. Earlier both countries inaugurated the Motihari–Amlekhgunj petroleum pipeline, the first cross country pipeline in south Asia. The pipeline can carry two million metric tonnes of petroleum products into Nepal and so far has led to a saving of over 800 million Nepali rupees.

With procurement of Covid vaccine in focus, Nepal FM to visit Delhi from tomorrow

An 'escape mutant's found in coronavirus has alarmed the scientific community as there are chances that the mutation may decrease the efficacy of coronavirus vaccines. This mutant has been found in South African variant of the coronavirus. 12 countries around the world have reported this variant.

The mutation has been named E484K. The mutant has been termed as an 'escape mutant because it may be able to escape antibodies produced against coronavirus vaccines.

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"We fear this mutation might have an impact, and what we don't know is the extent of the impact," said Penny Moore, Associate Professor, National Institute for Communicable Diseases in South Africa. She was quoted by CNN.

According to experts, the escape mutant may not render vaccines useless but they will reduce their efficacy.

However, the recent mutation may mean that battle to defeat coronavirus pandemic is far from over.

An 'escape mutant's found in coronavirus has alarmed the scientific community as there are chances that the mutation may decrease the efficacy of coronavirus vaccines.

An 'escape mutant's found in coronavirus has alarmed the scientific community as there are chances that the mutation may decrease the efficacy of coronavirus vaccines. This mutant has been found in South African variant of the coronavirus. 12 countries around the world have reported this variant. The mutation has been named E484K. The mutant has been termed as an 'escape mutant because it may be able to escape antibodies produced against coronavirus vaccines. × "We fear this mutation might have an impact, and what we don't know is the extent of the impact," said Penny Moore, Associate Professor, National Institute for Communicable Diseases in South Africa. She was quoted by CNN. According to experts, the escape mutant may not render vaccines useless but they will reduce their efficacy. However, the recent mutation may mean that battle to defeat coronavirus pandemic is far from over.

'Escape mutant' of coronavirus may decrease efficacy of vaccines: Experts

New infections, hospitalisations and deaths keep soaring in the United States -- so much so that while it took about 90 days for the United States to reach its first 2 million cases of coronavirus last year, it took just 10 days to hit 2.2 million cases in 2021.

Experts, to this end, have now suggested that at this rate, January 2021 might just turn out to be the worst in terms of these infections.

More than 27,000 new Covid-19 deaths have been reported in just the first 10 days of 2021, according to data from Johns Hopkins.

According to a report in CNN, at this rate, more people could die from Covid-19 in January than any other month of this pandemic. December had a record high of 77,431 deaths due to Covid-19.

On Saturday, the United States suffered 3,655 new Covid-19 deaths, along with 269,623 new infections. The crisis is now being expected to fare even worse in hard-hit Arizona.

Experts have also expressed concern about "the inevitable arrival of the more highly transmissible" strain of coronavirus that was first detected in the United Kingdom and has spread to at least eight US states, including California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, New York, Pennsylvania and Texas.

Thursday was the first day the US reported more than 4,000 new Covid-19 deaths in a single day. The toll could get worse as more hospitals fill up.

There were 129,229 Covid-19 patients in US hospitals on Sunday, according to the COVID Tracking Project -- the sixth highest figure recorded. It was the 40th consecutive day that US Covid-19 hospitalizations remained above 100,000.

Meanwhile, President-elect Joe Biden has said he aims to release nearly all available doses of Covid-19 vaccines in an effort to quickly ramp up the US vaccine rollout.

Time is absolutely of the essence. If there isn't enough vaccine in reserve for people to received second doses, the entire plan would come crashing down.

(with inputs)

New infections, hospitalisations and deaths keep soaring in the United States -- so much so that while it took about 90 days for the United States to reach its first 2 million cases of coronavirus last year, it took just 10 days to hit 2.

New infections, hospitalisations and deaths keep soaring in the United States -- so much so that while it took about 90 days for the United States to reach its first 2 million cases of coronavirus last year, it took just 10 days to hit 2.2 million cases in 2021. Experts, to this end, have now suggested that at this rate, January 2021 might just turn out to be the worst in terms of these infections. More than 27,000 new Covid-19 deaths have been reported in just the first 10 days of 2021, according to data from Johns Hopkins. According to a report in CNN, at this rate, more people could die from Covid-19 in January than any other month of this pandemic. December had a record high of 77,431 deaths due to Covid-19. On Saturday, the United States suffered 3,655 new Covid-19 deaths, along with 269,623 new infections. The crisis is now being expected to fare even worse in hard-hit Arizona. Experts have also expressed concern about "the inevitable arrival of the more highly transmissible" strain of coronavirus that was first detected in the United Kingdom and has spread to at least eight US states, including California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, New York, Pennsylvania and Texas. Thursday was the first day the US reported more than 4,000 new Covid-19 deaths in a single day. The toll could get worse as more hospitals fill up. There were 129,229 Covid-19 patients in US hospitals on Sunday, according to the COVID Tracking Project -- the sixth highest figure recorded. It was the 40th consecutive day that US Covid-19 hospitalizations remained above 100,000. Meanwhile, President-elect Joe Biden has said he aims to release nearly all available doses of Covid-19 vaccines in an effort to quickly ramp up the US vaccine rollout. Time is absolutely of the essence. If there isn't enough vaccine in reserve for people to received second doses, the entire plan would come crashing down. (with inputs)

January can turn out to be the deadliest month of Covid-19 in US, experts say

US President-elect Joe Biden will receive his second dose of the Covid-19 vaccine on Monday -- three weeks after his first injection was broadcast live on TV to boost public confidence in the jab.

Biden told Americans "there's nothing to worry about" when he got his first dose of the Pfizer vaccine at the Christiana Hospital in Newark, Delaware on December 21.

His team had said that his second jab would also be done in front of the media.

The United States has so far registered more than 374,000 deaths from Covid-19, and to this end, Biden on Friday slammed President Donald Trump administration's troubled distribution of vaccines as a "travesty."

About 6.7 million Americans have so far received their first shot -- far short of the target of 20 million by the end of 2020. But 22.1 million doses have been distributed nationwide, underlining the logistical challenge of getting the injections administered to the elderly and health workers who are the priority.

Both vaccines currently authorised in the US, developed by Pfizer and Moderna, require recipients to receive booster shots after three and four weeks, respectively.

Biden, who will be inaugurated on January 20, has said he plans to release every available dose of vaccine, rather than holding back half to make sure people receive their booster shots on time as is the current protocol.

US President-elect Joe Biden will receive his second dose of the Covid-19 vaccine on Monday -- three weeks after his first injection was broadcast live on TV to boost public confidence in the jab.

US President-elect Joe Biden will receive his second dose of the Covid-19 vaccine on Monday -- three weeks after his first injection was broadcast live on TV to boost public confidence in the jab. Biden told Americans "there's nothing to worry about" when he got his first dose of the Pfizer vaccine at the Christiana Hospital in Newark, Delaware on December 21. His team had said that his second jab would also be done in front of the media. The United States has so far registered more than 374,000 deaths from Covid-19, and to this end, Biden on Friday slammed President Donald Trump administration's troubled distribution of vaccines as a "travesty." About 6.7 million Americans have so far received their first shot -- far short of the target of 20 million by the end of 2020. But 22.1 million doses have been distributed nationwide, underlining the logistical challenge of getting the injections administered to the elderly and health workers who are the priority. Both vaccines currently authorised in the US, developed by Pfizer and Moderna, require recipients to receive booster shots after three and four weeks, respectively. Biden, who will be inaugurated on January 20, has said he plans to release every available dose of vaccine, rather than holding back half to make sure people receive their booster shots on time as is the current protocol.

Biden to receive second Covid vaccine dose on Monday

Spain will send special convoys carrying the COVID-19 vaccine on Sunday to areas cut off by Storm Filomena

Spain battles snow to distribute COVID vaccine

Russia announced Monday that 1.5 million people around the world had received its Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine as part of an initiative Kremlin critics have described as a geopolitical push.

The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), which has financed the development of the Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, confirmed the figure to AFP without offering a breakdown of where the jab was distributed.

"We cannot say how many of them are in Russia and in the rest of the world," RDIF spokesman Arseny Palagin said, adding that individual nations could release data separately.

Russia became the first country last August to register a vaccine, months ahead of Western competitors, and Moscow has boasted of more than one billion orders for the jab abroad.

Health Minister Mikhail Murashko said this month that more than 800,000 Russians had received Sputnik and that 1.5 million doses had been distributed throughout the country of around 147 million.

But there is scepticism surrounding Moscow's virus statistics and health officials in December conceded that the death toll from the pandemic was nearly four times higher than previously reported.

An adviser to Russia's health minister said over the weekend that consultations with the World Health Organisation for the use of Sputnik in emergency situations would begin January 20.

The designation would allow Sputnik V to be distributed as part of the WHO's emergency rollout to countries struggling to source vaccines independently.

Russia has over recent months been battered by a second wave of the coronavirus but the Kremlin has held back on introducing sweeping restrictive measures like in the beginning of the pandemic.

Russian officials say however that new daily cases have been decreasing in recent days, dropping closer to 20,000.

On Monday, authorities reported a total of 3,425,269 infections and more than 62,000 deaths.

Russia announced Monday that 1.5 million people around the world had received its Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine as part of an initiative Kremlin critics have described as a geopolitical push.

Russia announced Monday that 1.5 million people around the world had received its Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine as part of an initiative Kremlin critics have described as a geopolitical push. The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), which has financed the development of the Sputnik V coronavirus vaccine, confirmed the figure to AFP without offering a breakdown of where the jab was distributed. "We cannot say how many of them are in Russia and in the rest of the world," RDIF spokesman Arseny Palagin said, adding that individual nations could release data separately. Russia became the first country last August to register a vaccine, months ahead of Western competitors, and Moscow has boasted of more than one billion orders for the jab abroad. Health Minister Mikhail Murashko said this month that more than 800,000 Russians had received Sputnik and that 1.5 million doses had been distributed throughout the country of around 147 million. But there is scepticism surrounding Moscow's virus statistics and health officials in December conceded that the death toll from the pandemic was nearly four times higher than previously reported. An adviser to Russia's health minister said over the weekend that consultations with the World Health Organisation for the use of Sputnik in emergency situations would begin January 20. The designation would allow Sputnik V to be distributed as part of the WHO's emergency rollout to countries struggling to source vaccines independently. Russia has over recent months been battered by a second wave of the coronavirus but the Kremlin has held back on introducing sweeping restrictive measures like in the beginning of the pandemic. Russian officials say however that new daily cases have been decreasing in recent days, dropping closer to 20,000. On Monday, authorities reported a total of 3,425,269 infections and more than 62,000 deaths.

Russia says 1.5 million vaccinated globally with Sputnik V

Cuba will test its most advanced Covid vaccine candidate&nbsp;in Iran.

State-run Finlay Vaccine Institute (IFV) and the Pasteur Institute of Iran signed an agreement in Havana that will see a Phase 3 clinical trial in Iran, to "move forward faster in immunisation against Covid-19 in both countries," the IFV announced on Twitter.

It has been difficult to do Phase 3 clinical testing in Cuba because its outbreak has not been as serious as those in many larger countries.

The news came on the heels of Iran's supreme leader on Friday banning the import of American and British-produced vaccines against Covid-19, saying they were "completely untrustworthy."

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a tweet, accompanied by the hashtag #CoronaVaccine: "It's not unlikely they would want to contaminate other nations."

The Islamic republic has reported more than 1.2 million cases of the novel coronavirus, which have caused over 56,000 deaths.

It has accused the United States of hampering its access to vaccines through a tough sanctions regime.

The Sovereign 02 is the country's most advanced coronavirus vaccine candidate, showing "an early immune response (at 14 days)," IFV Director Vicente Verez said in December.

Although cases in Cuba are increasing due to the opening of its borders, the country of 11.2 million has seen about 14,000 cases and 148 deaths, lower figures than its neighbors in the region.

The Americas' only Communist-ruled state wants to have its entire population immunised with its own vaccines by the first half of 2021.

The Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology is working on two other vaccine candidates, called Mambisa and Abdala.

(with inputs)

Cuba will test its most advanced Covid vaccine candidate in Iran. State-run Finlay Vaccine Institute (IFV) and the Pasteur Institute of Iran signed an agreement in Havana that will see a Phase 3 clinical trial in Iran, to "move forward faster in immunisation against Covid-19 in both countries," the IFV announced on Twitter.

Cuba will test its most advanced Covid vaccine candidate in Iran. State-run Finlay Vaccine Institute (IFV) and the Pasteur Institute of Iran signed an agreement in Havana that will see a Phase 3 clinical trial in Iran, to "move forward faster in immunisation against Covid-19 in both countries," the IFV announced on Twitter. It has been difficult to do Phase 3 clinical testing in Cuba because its outbreak has not been as serious as those in many larger countries. The news came on the heels of Iran's supreme leader on Friday banning the import of American and British-produced vaccines against Covid-19, saying they were "completely untrustworthy." Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a tweet, accompanied by the hashtag #CoronaVaccine: "It's not unlikely they would want to contaminate other nations." The Islamic republic has reported more than 1.2 million cases of the novel coronavirus, which have caused over 56,000 deaths. It has accused the United States of hampering its access to vaccines through a tough sanctions regime. The Sovereign 02 is the country's most advanced coronavirus vaccine candidate, showing "an early immune response (at 14 days)," IFV Director Vicente Verez said in December. Although cases in Cuba are increasing due to the opening of its borders, the country of 11.2 million has seen about 14,000 cases and 148 deaths, lower figures than its neighbors in the region. The Americas' only Communist-ruled state wants to have its entire population immunised with its own vaccines by the first half of 2021. The Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology is working on two other vaccine candidates, called Mambisa and Abdala. (with inputs)

Cuba to test Covid vaccine candidate in Iran

Pope Francis and Britain's Queen Elizabeth became the latest high-profile figures to join the global vaccination campaign against the coronavirus, as the UK reported it had surpassed more than three million cases since the pandemic began more than a year ago.

More than 1.9 million people worldwide have now died from the virus, with new variants adding to soaring cases and prompting the re-introduction of restrictions on movement across the globe -- even as some countries begin mass inoculation campaigns.

Pope Francis urged people to get the vaccination, calling opposition to the jab "suicidal denial" and saying he would get inoculated against the virus himself next week when the Vatican would begin its campaign.

"There is a suicidal denial which I cannot explain, but today we have to get vaccinated," the pontiff said in segments from an interview with Canale 5 due to be broadcast in full on Sunday.

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II and her husband Prince Philip received their Covid-19 vaccinations on Saturday, Buckingham Palace said, in a rare public comment on the private health matters of the long-serving monarch.

A source told the domestic Press Association news agency that the queen, 94, and Philip, 99, were given the injections by a royal household doctor at Windsor Castle.

More than 1.5 million people in Britain have so far received virus jabs, as the biggest immunisation programme in its history rolls out with priority given to the elderly, their carers and health workers.

Countries across the globe are following suit, starting up massive vaccination campaigns with several coronavirus shots approved so far, including those by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna and domestically made jabs from Russia and China.

Britain, which has so far administered two types of vaccines, is racing to inoculate as many people as possible as a new variant believed to be more contagious pushes infections and deaths to unprecedented levels.

British health authorities on Saturday said the country had recorded more than three million coronavirus infections since the pandemic began last year, after the government announced another 59,937 new daily cases.

The country also recorded another 1,035 fatalities from the virus, taking the total death toll to 80,868, one of the highest in Europe alongside Italy.

Cases also continue to spiral in the United States, the world's worst hit country, which recorded more than 272,000 new cases Saturday. More than 22 million people have been infected and 372,051 have died of Covid-19 in the US since the pandemic began, according to Johns Hopkins University.

- Tighter restrictions -

India will launch one of the world's most ambitious coronavirus free vaccination drives next Saturday, aiming to reach 300 million people by July, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said.

India is the second worst-hit country with more than 10 million cases, though the death rate is one of the world's lowest.

Cuba, meanwhile, said it would test its most advanced Covid vaccine candidate in Iran, after Tehran banned the import of already-proven US and British-produced vaccines.&nbsp;

Fears have been rising over new virus variants that emerged in Britain and South Africa, but BioNTech brought some relief on Friday, saying its vaccine was effective against a "key mutation" found in the strains.

Soaring infections are forcing governments once again to introduce restrictions that helped slow the spread of the virus last year, but battered the global economy and disrupted business, sports and cultural events worldwide.

France will extend its Covid-19 curfews to a further eight departments, Prime Minister Jean Castex said Saturday, citing a "tough and necessary" response.

After a rise in cases, Burundi will close its land and lakeside borders from Monday and impose a seven-day quarantine on travellers arriving by plane, officials said.

- New British strain -

On Saturday the streets of the Australian city of Brisbane were quiet as its more than two million residents were ordered back into lockdown, after authorities detected a single infection of the new strain from Britain.

"Quite surreal, like something from a movie set," local man Scott told AFP in Brisbane's deserted downtown, though he added: "It's necessary."

And Israel said four people had tested positive for the new South African strain, which is also more infectious than the original. It had already recorded the new British variant.

In China, where the original coronavirus first emerged in late 2019, authorities also tightened restrictions on two cities near Beijing to stamp out a growing cluster.

The new week-long stay at home orders affecting about 18 million people in Shijiazhuang and Xingtai come as cases spike ahead of the Lunar New Year, when hundreds of millions criss-cross the country to visit family and friends.

On Saturday Beijing's National Health Commission said authorities had so far given out more than nine million vaccine doses, but warned the upcoming holiday would "further boost the risk of transmission."

China also said Saturday that preparations were still ongoing for a WHO mission to Wuhan to investigate the origins of Covid-19, following a rare rebuke from the UN body over a delay to the long-planned trip.

"As long as these experts complete the procedures and confirm their schedule, we will go to Wuhan together to carry out investigations," National Health Commission vice minister Zeng Yixin told reporters.

Pope Francis and Britain's Queen Elizabeth became the latest high-profile figures to join the global vaccination campaign against the coronavirus, as the UK reported it had surpassed more than three million cases since the pandemic began more than a year ago.

Pope Francis and Britain's Queen Elizabeth became the latest high-profile figures to join the global vaccination campaign against the coronavirus, as the UK reported it had surpassed more than three million cases since the pandemic began more than a year ago. More than 1.9 million people worldwide have now died from the virus, with new variants adding to soaring cases and prompting the re-introduction of restrictions on movement across the globe -- even as some countries begin mass inoculation campaigns. Pope Francis urged people to get the vaccination, calling opposition to the jab "suicidal denial" and saying he would get inoculated against the virus himself next week when the Vatican would begin its campaign. "There is a suicidal denial which I cannot explain, but today we have to get vaccinated," the pontiff said in segments from an interview with Canale 5 due to be broadcast in full on Sunday. Britain's Queen Elizabeth II and her husband Prince Philip received their Covid-19 vaccinations on Saturday, Buckingham Palace said, in a rare public comment on the private health matters of the long-serving monarch. A source told the domestic Press Association news agency that the queen, 94, and Philip, 99, were given the injections by a royal household doctor at Windsor Castle. More than 1.5 million people in Britain have so far received virus jabs, as the biggest immunisation programme in its history rolls out with priority given to the elderly, their carers and health workers. Countries across the globe are following suit, starting up massive vaccination campaigns with several coronavirus shots approved so far, including those by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna and domestically made jabs from Russia and China. Britain, which has so far administered two types of vaccines, is racing to inoculate as many people as possible as a new variant believed to be more contagious pushes infections and deaths to unprecedented levels. British health authorities on Saturday said the country had recorded more than three million coronavirus infections since the pandemic began last year, after the government announced another 59,937 new daily cases. The country also recorded another 1,035 fatalities from the virus, taking the total death toll to 80,868, one of the highest in Europe alongside Italy. Cases also continue to spiral in the United States, the world's worst hit country, which recorded more than 272,000 new cases Saturday. More than 22 million people have been infected and 372,051 have died of Covid-19 in the US since the pandemic began, according to Johns Hopkins University. - Tighter restrictions - India will launch one of the world's most ambitious coronavirus free vaccination drives next Saturday, aiming to reach 300 million people by July, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said. India is the second worst-hit country with more than 10 million cases, though the death rate is one of the world's lowest. Cuba, meanwhile, said it would test its most advanced Covid vaccine candidate in Iran, after Tehran banned the import of already-proven US and British-produced vaccines. Fears have been rising over new virus variants that emerged in Britain and South Africa, but BioNTech brought some relief on Friday, saying its vaccine was effective against a "key mutation" found in the strains. Soaring infections are forcing governments once again to introduce restrictions that helped slow the spread of the virus last year, but battered the global economy and disrupted business, sports and cultural events worldwide. France will extend its Covid-19 curfews to a further eight departments, Prime Minister Jean Castex said Saturday, citing a "tough and necessary" response. After a rise in cases, Burundi will close its land and lakeside borders from Monday and impose a seven-day quarantine on travellers arriving by plane, officials said. - New British strain - On Saturday the streets of the Australian city of Brisbane were quiet as its more than two million residents were ordered back into lockdown, after authorities detected a single infection of the new strain from Britain. "Quite surreal, like something from a movie set," local man Scott told AFP in Brisbane's deserted downtown, though he added: "It's necessary." And Israel said four people had tested positive for the new South African strain, which is also more infectious than the original. It had already recorded the new British variant. In China, where the original coronavirus first emerged in late 2019, authorities also tightened restrictions on two cities near Beijing to stamp out a growing cluster. The new week-long stay at home orders affecting about 18 million people in Shijiazhuang and Xingtai come as cases spike ahead of the Lunar New Year, when hundreds of millions criss-cross the country to visit family and friends. On Saturday Beijing's National Health Commission said authorities had so far given out more than nine million vaccine doses, but warned the upcoming holiday would "further boost the risk of transmission." China also said Saturday that preparations were still ongoing for a WHO mission to Wuhan to investigate the origins of Covid-19, following a rare rebuke from the UN body over a delay to the long-planned trip. "As long as these experts complete the procedures and confirm their schedule, we will go to Wuhan together to carry out investigations," National Health Commission vice minister Zeng Yixin told reporters.

UK tops 3 million Covid cases, Pope, Queen Elizabeth join vaccine drive

Just weeks into the country’s coronavirus vaccination effort, states have begun broadening access to the shots faster than planned, amid tremendous public demand and intense criticism about the pace of the rollout.

Some public health officials worry that doing so could bring even more chaos to the complex operation and increase the likelihood that some of the highest-risk Americans will be skipped over. But the debate over how soon to expand eligibility is intensifying as deaths from the virus continue to surge, hospitals are overwhelmed with critically ill patients, and millions of vaccine doses delivered last month remain in freezers.

Governors are under enormous pressure from their constituents — especially older people, who vote in great numbers and face the highest risk of dying from the virus — to get the doses they receive into arms swiftly. President-elect Joe Biden’s decision, announced Friday, to release nearly all available doses to the states when he takes office Jan. 20, rather than holding half to guarantee each recipient gets a booster shot a few weeks after the first, is likely to add to that pressure.

Some states, including Florida, Louisiana and Texas, have already expanded who is eligible to get a vaccine now, even though many people in the first priority group recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — the nation’s 21 million health care workers and 3 million residents of nursing homes and other long-term care facilities — have not yet received a shot.

On Friday afternoon, New York became the latest state to do so, announcing that it would allow people 75 and older and certain essential workers to start receiving a vaccine Monday.

But reaching a wider swath of the population requires much more money than states have received for the task, many health officials say, and more time to fine-tune systems for moving surplus vaccine around quickly, to increase the number of vaccination sites and people who give the shots, and to establish reliable appointment systems to prevent endless lines and waits.

Some states’ expansions have led to frantic and often futile efforts by older people to get vaccinated. After Florida opened up vaccinations to anyone 65 and older late last month, the demand was so great that new online registration portals quickly overloaded and crashed, people spent hours on the phone trying to secure appointments, and others waited overnight at scattered pop-up sites offering shots on a first-come, first-served basis.

Similar scenes have played out in parts of Texas, Tennessee and a handful of other states.

Still, with CDC data suggesting that only about one-third of the doses distributed so far have been used, Alex Azar, the health and human services secretary, told reporters this past week, “It would be much better to move quickly and end up vaccinating some lower-priority people than to let vaccines sit around while states try to micromanage this process. Faster administration would save lives right now, which means we cannot let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”

The CDC guidelines were drawn up by an independent committee of medical and public health experts that advises the agency on immunization practices; it deliberated for months about who should get vaccinated initially, while supplies were still very limited. The committee weighed scientific evidence about who is most at risk of getting very sick or dying from COVID-19, as well as ethical questions, such as how best to ensure equal access among different races and socioeconomic groups.

Although the committee’s recommendations are nonbinding, states usually follow them; in this case, the committee suggests that states might consider expanding to additional priority groups “when demand in the current phase appears to have been met,” “when supply of authorized vaccine increases substantially” or “when vaccine supply within a certain location is in danger of going unused.”

Dr. Kevin Ault, an obstetrician at the University of Kansas Medical Center who serves on the advisory committee that came up with the CDC guidelines, said that it was reasonable for states to start vaccinating new groups before finishing others but that they should be careful about exacerbating inequities and biting off more than they can chew.

“Obviously if you’re going to vaccinate that group, you need to have a well-thought-out plan in hand,” he said, referring to the over-65 population. “Having people camping out for vaccine is less than ideal, I would say.”

He added, “We put a lot of thought and effort into our guidelines, and I think they are good.”

After the first vaccines were given in mid-December, a dichotomy emerged between governors who were adhering precisely to the guidelines and others who moved quickly to populations beyond health care workers and nursing home residents.

Until Friday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York, a Democrat, had threatened to penalize hospitals that provided shots to people who are not health care workers. By contrast, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, a Republican, traveled to retirement communities around his state to emphasize the importance of getting people 65 and older, who number more than 5 million there, immunized fast.

“In Florida we’ve got to put our parents and grandparents first,” DeSantis said at The Villages, the nation’s largest retirement community, just before Christmas.

Decisions on how soon to expand eligibility for the shots have not fallen neatly along partisan lines.

Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland, a Republican, announced Tuesday that he would immediately switch to what he called the “Southwest Airlines model” for vaccine allocation, referring to the airline’s open seating policy. “We’re no longer going to be waiting for all the members of a particular priority group to be completed,” he said, “before we move on to begin the next group in line.”

Gov. Mike DeWine of Ohio, a Republican, urged patience in a news briefing Tuesday as he declined to estimate when the state would start vaccinating people beyond the first priority group, known as “1a.”

“We’re asking every health department, ‘Don’t go outside 1a; stay within your lane,’” he said, adding about the vaccines, “This is a scarce commodity.”

By Thursday DeWine had set a date for people 80 and older to start getting the vaccine — Jan. 19 — and said he would phase in everyone 65 and older, as well as teachers, by Feb. 8.

The reasons so many doses received by states have not yet been administered to the first priority group are manifold. The fact that vaccination began around Christmas, when many hospital employees were taking vacation, slowed things. More health care workers are refusing to get the vaccine than many of their employers expected, and some hospitals and clinics received more doses than they needed but felt constrained by state rules from giving them to people outside the first priority groups. Some initially worried they could not even offer leftover doses in open vials to people in lower priority groups and let them go to waste.

And federal funding for vaccination efforts has been slow to reach states and localities: They got only $350 million through the end of last year, a little more than $1 per resident of the country. The economic rescue package that Congress passed in December included $8 billion for vaccine distribution that state health officials had long sought, but the first tranche of it, about $3 billion, is only now starting to be sent out.

“There was great funding in the development of these products, great funding in the infrastructure to ship them and get them out,” said Dr. Steven Stack, commissioner of the Kentucky Department for Public Health. “But then there was no funding provided of meaning for administering the vaccine, which is the last mile of this journey.”

The CDC has recommended that a “1b” group consisting of people 75 and older and certain essential workers, including teachers, corrections officers and grocery store employees, be vaccinated next. The second group is much larger, about 50 million people. And the third recommended priority group — people 65 to 74, anyone 16 and older with high-risk medical conditions, and essential workers not already reached — numbers almost 130 million.

Pfizer and Moderna have pledged to deliver enough vaccine doses for 100 million people to each get the two necessary shots by the end of March, and many more in the second quarter. Several other vaccine candidates are far along in the pipeline and, if approved for emergency use here, could help ramp up distribution more quickly.

The CDC committee initially considered recommending that a wide range of essential workers get vaccinated before older Americans. Its rationale was that many essential workers are low-wage people of color, who have been hit disproportionately hard by the virus and had limited access to good health care. That sparked a backlash, and several governors, including DeSantis, quickly made clear they would cater to older people first.

Dr. Mark McClellan, who formerly headed the FDA and now runs Duke University’s health policy center, said that while pushing ahead to vaccinate older people and other particularly vulnerable groups would accelerate the overall effort, “we’re going to be missing a lot of higher-risk individuals along the way.”

“I do worry about that becoming uneven in terms of access,” he said during a press briefing, “with lower-income groups, minority groups maybe in a tougher position if we don’t make it very easy for people in these high-risk groups to get vaccinated.”

Dr. Marcus Plescia, chief medical officer for the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, said he was surprised to hear federal officials like Azar and Dr. Jerome Adams, the surgeon general, advocate expanding vaccine access so broadly so soon.

“We didn’t come up with priority populations to slow things down but because we knew there would be limited numbers of doses,” Plescia said. “If we try to do this in an equitable, fair way, it’s not going to be as fast as if our only goal is to get vaccine into as many arms as possible.”

Whether or not they are widening access now, governors are ramping up pressure on hospitals to use their allocated doses more quickly. Cuomo threatened to fine those that did not use their initial allocations by the end of this past week and not send them any more.

Hogan warned hospitals this past week, “Either use the doses that have been allocated to you, or they will be directed to another facility or provider.”

Just weeks into the country’s coronavirus vaccination effort, states have begun broadening access to the shots faster than planned, amid tremendous public demand and intense criticism about the pace of the rollout.

Just weeks into the country’s coronavirus vaccination effort, states have begun broadening access to the shots faster than planned, amid tremendous public demand and intense criticism about the pace of the rollout. Some public health officials worry that doing so could bring even more chaos to the complex operation and increase the likelihood that some of the highest-risk Americans will be skipped over. But the debate over how soon to expand eligibility is intensifying as deaths from the virus continue to surge, hospitals are overwhelmed with critically ill patients, and millions of vaccine doses delivered last month remain in freezers. Governors are under enormous pressure from their constituents — especially older people, who vote in great numbers and face the highest risk of dying from the virus — to get the doses they receive into arms swiftly. President-elect Joe Biden’s decision, announced Friday, to release nearly all available doses to the states when he takes office Jan. 20, rather than holding half to guarantee each recipient gets a booster shot a few weeks after the first, is likely to add to that pressure. Some states, including Florida, Louisiana and Texas, have already expanded who is eligible to get a vaccine now, even though many people in the first priority group recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — the nation’s 21 million health care workers and 3 million residents of nursing homes and other long-term care facilities — have not yet received a shot. On Friday afternoon, New York became the latest state to do so, announcing that it would allow people 75 and older and certain essential workers to start receiving a vaccine Monday. But reaching a wider swath of the population requires much more money than states have received for the task, many health officials say, and more time to fine-tune systems for moving surplus vaccine around quickly, to increase the number of vaccination sites and people who give the shots, and to establish reliable appointment systems to prevent endless lines and waits. Some states’ expansions have led to frantic and often futile efforts by older people to get vaccinated. After Florida opened up vaccinations to anyone 65 and older late last month, the demand was so great that new online registration portals quickly overloaded and crashed, people spent hours on the phone trying to secure appointments, and others waited overnight at scattered pop-up sites offering shots on a first-come, first-served basis. Similar scenes have played out in parts of Texas, Tennessee and a handful of other states. Still, with CDC data suggesting that only about one-third of the doses distributed so far have been used, Alex Azar, the health and human services secretary, told reporters this past week, “It would be much better to move quickly and end up vaccinating some lower-priority people than to let vaccines sit around while states try to micromanage this process. Faster administration would save lives right now, which means we cannot let the perfect be the enemy of the good.” The CDC guidelines were drawn up by an independent committee of medical and public health experts that advises the agency on immunization practices; it deliberated for months about who should get vaccinated initially, while supplies were still very limited. The committee weighed scientific evidence about who is most at risk of getting very sick or dying from COVID-19, as well as ethical questions, such as how best to ensure equal access among different races and socioeconomic groups. Although the committee’s recommendations are nonbinding, states usually follow them; in this case, the committee suggests that states might consider expanding to additional priority groups “when demand in the current phase appears to have been met,” “when supply of authorized vaccine increases substantially” or “when vaccine supply within a certain location is in danger of going unused.” Dr. Kevin Ault, an obstetrician at the University of Kansas Medical Center who serves on the advisory committee that came up with the CDC guidelines, said that it was reasonable for states to start vaccinating new groups before finishing others but that they should be careful about exacerbating inequities and biting off more than they can chew. “Obviously if you’re going to vaccinate that group, you need to have a well-thought-out plan in hand,” he said, referring to the over-65 population. “Having people camping out for vaccine is less than ideal, I would say.” He added, “We put a lot of thought and effort into our guidelines, and I think they are good.” After the first vaccines were given in mid-December, a dichotomy emerged between governors who were adhering precisely to the guidelines and others who moved quickly to populations beyond health care workers and nursing home residents. Until Friday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York, a Democrat, had threatened to penalize hospitals that provided shots to people who are not health care workers. By contrast, Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida, a Republican, traveled to retirement communities around his state to emphasize the importance of getting people 65 and older, who number more than 5 million there, immunized fast. “In Florida we’ve got to put our parents and grandparents first,” DeSantis said at The Villages, the nation’s largest retirement community, just before Christmas. Decisions on how soon to expand eligibility for the shots have not fallen neatly along partisan lines. Gov. Larry Hogan of Maryland, a Republican, announced Tuesday that he would immediately switch to what he called the “Southwest Airlines model” for vaccine allocation, referring to the airline’s open seating policy. “We’re no longer going to be waiting for all the members of a particular priority group to be completed,” he said, “before we move on to begin the next group in line.” Gov. Mike DeWine of Ohio, a Republican, urged patience in a news briefing Tuesday as he declined to estimate when the state would start vaccinating people beyond the first priority group, known as “1a.” “We’re asking every health department, ‘Don’t go outside 1a; stay within your lane,’” he said, adding about the vaccines, “This is a scarce commodity.” By Thursday DeWine had set a date for people 80 and older to start getting the vaccine — Jan. 19 — and said he would phase in everyone 65 and older, as well as teachers, by Feb. 8. The reasons so many doses received by states have not yet been administered to the first priority group are manifold. The fact that vaccination began around Christmas, when many hospital employees were taking vacation, slowed things. More health care workers are refusing to get the vaccine than many of their employers expected, and some hospitals and clinics received more doses than they needed but felt constrained by state rules from giving them to people outside the first priority groups. Some initially worried they could not even offer leftover doses in open vials to people in lower priority groups and let them go to waste. And federal funding for vaccination efforts has been slow to reach states and localities: They got only $350 million through the end of last year, a little more than $1 per resident of the country. The economic rescue package that Congress passed in December included $8 billion for vaccine distribution that state health officials had long sought, but the first tranche of it, about $3 billion, is only now starting to be sent out. “There was great funding in the development of these products, great funding in the infrastructure to ship them and get them out,” said Dr. Steven Stack, commissioner of the Kentucky Department for Public Health. “But then there was no funding provided of meaning for administering the vaccine, which is the last mile of this journey.” The CDC has recommended that a “1b” group consisting of people 75 and older and certain essential workers, including teachers, corrections officers and grocery store employees, be vaccinated next. The second group is much larger, about 50 million people. And the third recommended priority group — people 65 to 74, anyone 16 and older with high-risk medical conditions, and essential workers not already reached — numbers almost 130 million. Pfizer and Moderna have pledged to deliver enough vaccine doses for 100 million people to each get the two necessary shots by the end of March, and many more in the second quarter. Several other vaccine candidates are far along in the pipeline and, if approved for emergency use here, could help ramp up distribution more quickly. The CDC committee initially considered recommending that a wide range of essential workers get vaccinated before older Americans. Its rationale was that many essential workers are low-wage people of color, who have been hit disproportionately hard by the virus and had limited access to good health care. That sparked a backlash, and several governors, including DeSantis, quickly made clear they would cater to older people first. Dr. Mark McClellan, who formerly headed the FDA and now runs Duke University’s health policy center, said that while pushing ahead to vaccinate older people and other particularly vulnerable groups would accelerate the overall effort, “we’re going to be missing a lot of higher-risk individuals along the way.” “I do worry about that becoming uneven in terms of access,” he said during a press briefing, “with lower-income groups, minority groups maybe in a tougher position if we don’t make it very easy for people in these high-risk groups to get vaccinated.” Dr. Marcus Plescia, chief medical officer for the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, said he was surprised to hear federal officials like Azar and Dr. Jerome Adams, the surgeon general, advocate expanding vaccine access so broadly so soon. “We didn’t come up with priority populations to slow things down but because we knew there would be limited numbers of doses,” Plescia said. “If we try to do this in an equitable, fair way, it’s not going to be as fast as if our only goal is to get vaccine into as many arms as possible.” Whether or not they are widening access now, governors are ramping up pressure on hospitals to use their allocated doses more quickly. Cuomo threatened to fine those that did not use their initial allocations by the end of this past week and not send them any more. Hogan warned hospitals this past week, “Either use the doses that have been allocated to you, or they will be directed to another facility or provider.”

Pressure grows for states to open vaccines to more groups of people

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday said the nation would continue to export medicines including vaccines.

India is currently developing two indigenous COVID-19 vaccines.

In his address at the inauguration of the 16th Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) Convention, Modi said the country is among the nations with the lowest fatality rate and the highest recovery rate, adding India is ready with not one but two made-in-India coronavirus vaccines for the protection of humanity.

"Being the pharmacy of the world, India has supplied important medicines to all those in need in the world in the past and is also doing so now. The world is not only waiting for Indian vaccines but is also watching how India runs the world biggest vaccination programme," he said.

Modi also said that during the pandemic, Indians showed their capabilities and the way the country stood together was unparalleled.

He said India is using technology to defeat corruption and crores of rupees are being directly transferred to beneficiaries' bank accounts.

"Today we have been connected with the internet from various corners of the world but our minds are always connected with 'Maa Bharti'," he said.

"I have had a dialogue with several heads of states who told me how Indian diaspora has extended a helping hand in those countries and provided leadership in extending assistance even in these difficult times," Modi said.

"This was a matter of pride for me."

He also lauded the Indian diaspora for providing assistance in the battle against coronavirus in India.

Modi told the Indian diaspora that the country always stands with them and pointed out that over 45 lakh people were rescued under the government's Vande Bharat mission during the pandemic.

Modi also asserted that if democracy is most strong, vibrant and lively anywhere in the world, it is in India.

"When India got Independence then it was said that such a poor and under-literate country will disintegrate and democracy was impossible here. Today's truth is that India is united and if democracy is most strong, vibrant and lively anywhere in the world, it is in India," he said.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday said the nation would continue to export medicines including vaccines. India is currently developing two indigenous COVID-19 vaccines.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday said the nation would continue to export medicines including vaccines. India is currently developing two indigenous COVID-19 vaccines. In his address at the inauguration of the 16th Pravasi Bharatiya Divas (PBD) Convention, Modi said the country is among the nations with the lowest fatality rate and the highest recovery rate, adding India is ready with not one but two made-in-India coronavirus vaccines for the protection of humanity. "Being the pharmacy of the world, India has supplied important medicines to all those in need in the world in the past and is also doing so now. The world is not only waiting for Indian vaccines but is also watching how India runs the world biggest vaccination programme," he said. Modi also said that during the pandemic, Indians showed their capabilities and the way the country stood together was unparalleled. He said India is using technology to defeat corruption and crores of rupees are being directly transferred to beneficiaries' bank accounts. "Today we have been connected with the internet from various corners of the world but our minds are always connected with 'Maa Bharti'," he said. "I have had a dialogue with several heads of states who told me how Indian diaspora has extended a helping hand in those countries and provided leadership in extending assistance even in these difficult times," Modi said. "This was a matter of pride for me." He also lauded the Indian diaspora for providing assistance in the battle against coronavirus in India. Modi told the Indian diaspora that the country always stands with them and pointed out that over 45 lakh people were rescued under the government's Vande Bharat mission during the pandemic. Modi also asserted that if democracy is most strong, vibrant and lively anywhere in the world, it is in India. "When India got Independence then it was said that such a poor and under-literate country will disintegrate and democracy was impossible here. Today's truth is that India is united and if democracy is most strong, vibrant and lively anywhere in the world, it is in India," he said.

India will continue export of medicines, including vaccines: PM Modi

US President-elect Joe Biden, in the aftermath of President Donald Trump finally conceding defeat, has not held back from expressing disgust at what followed after the November 3 vote.

On Friday, while speaking to reporters in Wilmington, Biden also directed his angst at how Trump had&nbsp;been leading the US for four years, and how his administration's handling of the coronavirus pandemic has been a disappointment.

Biden slammed the Trump administration's distribution of Covid-19 vaccines as a "travesty," and announced a plan to speed up rollout that could delay people's second dose.

"Vaccines give us hope, but the roll-out has been a travesty," Biden told reporters in Wilmington, Delaware.

He said distribution of the vaccine would be "the greatest operational challenge we will ever face as a nation."

More than 365,000 people have died from the coronavirus in America, the world's hardest-hit country, including some 4,000 on Thursday alone.

Biden's comments came shortly after a spokesman said the new administration planned to release every available dose of Covid-19 vaccine produced in the country, rather than holding back half the supply to make sure people receive their booster shots on time.

But it was not clear how this plan would address the problem, since the main bottleneck in the US currently is not scarcity of vaccines, but rather the slow administration of shots by providers.

Around six million Americans have so far received their first shot, even though the target for December alone had been 20 million.

Biden also welcomed Trump's announcement that he wouldn't attend the January 20 inauguration, calling it a "good thing."

"I was told on the way over here that he indicated he wasn't going to show up at the inauguration. One of the few things he and I have ever agreed on," Biden said, adding, "it's a good thing, him not showing up."

"He's been an embarrassment to the country," Biden said.

"He's not fit to serve," the president-elect added of Trump, who is facing the possibility of being impeached next week for inciting his supporters to storm the US Capitol.

"He exceeded even my worst notions about him," Biden said.&nbsp;

"He's one of the most incompetent presidents in the history of the United States of America."

Biden said Vice-President Mike Pence would be welcome at his inauguration.

Meanwhile, Trump -- for the first time ever -- acknowledged Biden won, on Thursday, but said he would not attend the January 20 inauguration.

Trump's bowing down to the results came shortly after his supporters rioted at the US Capitol on Wednesday night, drawing sharp criticism from across the world.

To this end, Biden said those who stormed the US Capitol were a bunch of thugs, white supremacists, domestic terrorists and they should be prosecuted.

Biden said the authorities had to be held accountable for the failures that occurred and it had to be made sure that this could never, ever happen again.

"They should be treated as they're a bunch of thugs, insurrectionist, white supremacists, and anti-Semites, and it's not enough.

"These are bunch of thugs, thugs and their terrorists, domestic terrorists. And that'll be a judgment for the Justice Department to make as to what the charges should be...

"They should be prosecuted," he said in response to a question.

Biden sought an investigation into purported pictures of the Capitol Police personnel taking selfies with the protesters.

(with inputs)

US President-elect Joe Biden, in the aftermath of President Donald Trump finally conceding defeat, has not held back from expressing disgust at what followed after the November 3 vote.

US President-elect Joe Biden, in the aftermath of President Donald Trump finally conceding defeat, has not held back from expressing disgust at what followed after the November 3 vote. On Friday, while speaking to reporters in Wilmington, Biden also directed his angst at how Trump had been leading the US for four years, and how his administration's handling of the coronavirus pandemic has been a disappointment. Biden slammed the Trump administration's distribution of Covid-19 vaccines as a "travesty," and announced a plan to speed up rollout that could delay people's second dose. "Vaccines give us hope, but the roll-out has been a travesty," Biden told reporters in Wilmington, Delaware. He said distribution of the vaccine would be "the greatest operational challenge we will ever face as a nation." More than 365,000 people have died from the coronavirus in America, the world's hardest-hit country, including some 4,000 on Thursday alone. Biden's comments came shortly after a spokesman said the new administration planned to release every available dose of Covid-19 vaccine produced in the country, rather than holding back half the supply to make sure people receive their booster shots on time. But it was not clear how this plan would address the problem, since the main bottleneck in the US currently is not scarcity of vaccines, but rather the slow administration of shots by providers. Around six million Americans have so far received their first shot, even though the target for December alone had been 20 million. Biden also welcomed Trump's announcement that he wouldn't attend the January 20 inauguration, calling it a "good thing." "I was told on the way over here that he indicated he wasn't going to show up at the inauguration. One of the few things he and I have ever agreed on," Biden said, adding, "it's a good thing, him not showing up." "He's been an embarrassment to the country," Biden said. "He's not fit to serve," the president-elect added of Trump, who is facing the possibility of being impeached next week for inciting his supporters to storm the US Capitol. "He exceeded even my worst notions about him," Biden said. "He's one of the most incompetent presidents in the history of the United States of America." Biden said Vice-President Mike Pence would be welcome at his inauguration. Meanwhile, Trump -- for the first time ever -- acknowledged Biden won, on Thursday, but said he would not attend the January 20 inauguration. Trump's bowing down to the results came shortly after his supporters rioted at the US Capitol on Wednesday night, drawing sharp criticism from across the world. To this end, Biden said those who stormed the US Capitol were a bunch of thugs, white supremacists, domestic terrorists and they should be prosecuted. Biden said the authorities had to be held accountable for the failures that occurred and it had to be made sure that this could never, ever happen again. "They should be treated as they're a bunch of thugs, insurrectionist, white supremacists, and anti-Semites, and it's not enough. "These are bunch of thugs, thugs and their terrorists, domestic terrorists. And that'll be a judgment for the Justice Department to make as to what the charges should be... "They should be prosecuted," he said in response to a question. Biden sought an investigation into purported pictures of the Capitol Police personnel taking selfies with the protesters. (with inputs)

Biden likes Trump's decision to skip inauguration, slams vaccine rollout

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has announced that the country is ready to supply Coronavirus vaccine to the world. PM Modi's declaration came when India revealed the launch date for the biggest vaccination drive in the world.

India to launch vaccination drive on January 16

Indonesia's top Islamic body has given religious approval to China's Sinovac vaccine just days before the country is set to start its inoculation programme.

Indonesian clerics declare Sinovac's vaccine 'Halal'

Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong received his first shot of a COVID-19 vaccine on Friday, and urged others to take the jabs in a country that has largely brought the pandemic under control.

Unlike other mass vaccination programmes in the United States and Britain, Singapore is administering the jabs having largely eradicated the disease and has reported only a handful of local cases in recent months.

The government has said its studies show nearly 60% of residents are willing to be vaccinated. But the plans have stirred rare hesitancy among some due to the low risk of infection in the island nation and concern about any possible side effects from rapidly developed vaccines.

"It will make us safer, and it will make you and your loved ones safer too, so please take it when you can," Lee, 68, said after receiving the jab at a local hospital.

Singapore has only approved Pfizer-BioNTech`s vaccine but has said it has secured enough doses for its 5.7 million population including from other vaccine-makers like Moderna and Sinovac.

The city-state did some initial vaccinations of frontline workers at the end of December. But Lee said broader vaccinations of healthcare staff would start on Friday, with the elderly to follow next month, and vaccines to be available to all residents by year end at the latest.

"We got vaccinated early to show Singaporeans we are confident that the vaccine is safe and effective," Lee said in a Facebook post, adding that he had been vaccinated alongside the country`s top health official, Kenneth Mak, and "felt fine".

The vaccinations are voluntary but authorities have said they will consider relaxing travel restrictions for people who have been vaccinated against the disease which has killed around 1.9 million people globally.

Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong received his first shot of a COVID-19 vaccine on Friday, and urged others to take the jabs in a country that has largely brought the pandemic under control.

Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong received his first shot of a COVID-19 vaccine on Friday, and urged others to take the jabs in a country that has largely brought the pandemic under control. Unlike other mass vaccination programmes in the United States and Britain, Singapore is administering the jabs having largely eradicated the disease and has reported only a handful of local cases in recent months. The government has said its studies show nearly 60% of residents are willing to be vaccinated. But the plans have stirred rare hesitancy among some due to the low risk of infection in the island nation and concern about any possible side effects from rapidly developed vaccines. "It will make us safer, and it will make you and your loved ones safer too, so please take it when you can," Lee, 68, said after receiving the jab at a local hospital. Singapore has only approved Pfizer-BioNTech`s vaccine but has said it has secured enough doses for its 5.7 million population including from other vaccine-makers like Moderna and Sinovac. The city-state did some initial vaccinations of frontline workers at the end of December. But Lee said broader vaccinations of healthcare staff would start on Friday, with the elderly to follow next month, and vaccines to be available to all residents by year end at the latest. "We got vaccinated early to show Singaporeans we are confident that the vaccine is safe and effective," Lee said in a Facebook post, adding that he had been vaccinated alongside the country`s top health official, Kenneth Mak, and "felt fine". The vaccinations are voluntary but authorities have said they will consider relaxing travel restrictions for people who have been vaccinated against the disease which has killed around 1.9 million people globally.

Singapore PM receives Covid vaccine, urges his countrymen to get it too

A new video posted none other than Donald Trump Jr shows his father and US President Donald Trump 'partying' just hours before the Capitol Hill violence. Meanwhile, 26/11 Mumbai terror attack mastermind Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi has been has been handed a 15-year sentence by a court in Pakistan. In other news, Bangladesh has demanded apology from Pakistan for 1971 genocide. Read this and much more in our Top 10 world News

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/video-donald-trump-was-partying-just-hours-before-capitol-hill-violence-355417">Video: Donald Trump was 'partying' just hours before Capitol Hill violence</a>

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/video-donald-trump-was-partying-just-hours-before-capitol-hill-violence-355417"><img alt="Trump" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="ad17bf3c-d531-4559-a4a0-73eeaa52ebbb" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/Trump_9.JPG" /></a> 
 
The video has been posted by none other than Donald Trump Jr. and has since gone viral as many people are sharing it online

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/india-news/mumbai-terror-attack-mastermind-zaki-ur-rehman-lakhvi-sentenced-by-pakistan-court-for-15-years-355381">Mumbai terror attack mastermind Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi sentenced by Pakistan court for 15 years</a>

<img alt="Lakhvi" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="1e95639e-7bd0-4ea6-87f1-b1d765320e6f" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/Lakhvi.JPG" />

LeT commander Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi was the mastermind behind the 26/11 attacks that claimed 166 lives and injured 300 others after coordinated shootouts and bombings.

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/iranian-supreme-leader-announces-ban-of-covid-19-vaccines-from-us-uk-355450">Iranian Supreme Leader announces ban of Covid-19 vaccines from US, UK</a>

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/iranian-supreme-leader-announces-ban-of-covid-19-vaccines-from-us-uk-355450"><img alt="Iran" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="25807863-795a-4326-949d-d0fab45c5dc5" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/Iran_7.JPG" /></a> 
 
Iran is the worst-affected hit country by the pandemic in the Middle East and the first cases emerged in February 2020

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/a-year-after-wuhan-outbreak-two-chinese-cities-placed-under-lockdown-355423">A year after Wuhan outbreak, two Chinese cities placed under lockdown</a>

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/a-year-after-wuhan-outbreak-two-chinese-cities-placed-under-lockdown-355423"><img alt="Wuhan" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="be96fce3-38cf-4220-ac18-aef32f9ed40c" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/Wuhan.JPG" /></a> 
 
Hebei province in northern China in the last week saw 17 new coronavirus infections and 183 asymptomatic cases

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/south-asia/bangladesh-demands-apology-from-pakistan-for-1971-genocide-355406">Bangladesh demands apology from Pakistan for 1971 genocide</a>

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/south-asia/bangladesh-demands-apology-from-pakistan-for-1971-genocide-355406"><img alt="Bangladesh" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="20d2a69e-e2b5-401d-8297-174c9922f621" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/Bangladesh_0.JPG" /></a> 
 
The development comes in the year in which Bangladesh celebrates 50 years of Independence

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/moderna-covid-vaccine-gets-approval-in-uk-355443">Moderna COVID vaccine gets approval in UK</a>

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/moderna-covid-vaccine-gets-approval-in-uk-355443"><img alt="Moderna" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="4c853e67-233c-4c58-b3d9-70b538bf0513" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/moderna.JPG" /></a> 
 
UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock welcomed the development and said that the approval was another shot in the arm for UK's vaccination programme

 
<a href="https://www.wionews.com/technology/youtube-removes-thousands-of-videos-posted-from-donald-trumps-channel-355435">YouTube removes thousands of videos posted from Donald Trump's channel</a>

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/technology/youtube-removes-thousands-of-videos-posted-from-donald-trumps-channel-355435"><img alt="Trump" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="47696509-ef78-4396-875e-ecafd6508eca" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/Trump%20Youtube.JPG" /></a> 
 
Following the violence and ruckus seen at the US Capitol, earlier social media giants Twitter and Facebook on Thursday suspended Trump's accounts

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/south-asia/dont-blackmail-me-pm-imran-khan-to-hazara-protesters-355412">Don't blackmail me: PM Imran Khan to Hazara protesters</a>

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/south-asia/dont-blackmail-me-pm-imran-khan-to-hazara-protesters-355412"><img alt="Imran Khan" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="c92f0870-dcf1-4f87-8ffc-27fd983cb77a" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/Imran%20Khan_2.JPG" /></a> 
 
Imran Khan said that the government has accepted all the demands of the minority community, except one that the prime minister must visit before the dead are buried

 
<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/trump-presidency-set-for-an-ugly-ending-says-former-italian-premier-silvio-berlusconi-355427">Trump presidency set for an 'ugly ending', says former Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi</a>

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/trump-presidency-set-for-an-ugly-ending-says-former-italian-premier-silvio-berlusconi-355427"><img alt="Berlusconi" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="92c257c7-7c29-45ac-a6bd-863b223c334a" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/Silvio%20Berlusconi.JPG" /></a> 
 
The Italian said "it would be unjust and uncharitable" to deny Trump's achievements as US President, notably on the economy and on foreign policy.&nbsp;

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/amazon-rainforest-will-vanish-by-2064-new-study-predicts-355322">Amazon rainforest will vanish by 2064, new study predicts</a>

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/amazon-rainforest-will-vanish-by-2064-new-study-predicts-355322"><img alt="Amazon" data-entity-type="file" data-entity-uuid="4612b78b-3c59-4ca4-8e39-68b3d538e4fb" src="//cdn.wionews.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/Amazon.JPG" /></a> 
 
World’s largest tropical rainforest, Amazon rainforest will vanish by 2064 due to alarming levels of deforestation and droughts occurring in the region from the climate change.

A new video posted none other than Donald Trump Jr shows his father and US President Donald Trump 'partying' just hours before the Capitol Hill violence. Meanwhile, 26/11 Mumbai terror attack mastermind Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi has been has been handed a 15-year sentence by a court in Pakistan.

A new video posted none other than Donald Trump Jr shows his father and US President Donald Trump 'partying' just hours before the Capitol Hill violence. Meanwhile, 26/11 Mumbai terror attack mastermind Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi has been has been handed a 15-year sentence by a court in Pakistan. In other news, Bangladesh has demanded apology from Pakistan for 1971 genocide. Read this and much more in our Top 10 world News Video: Donald Trump was 'partying' just hours before Capitol Hill violence The video has been posted by none other than Donald Trump Jr. and has since gone viral as many people are sharing it online Mumbai terror attack mastermind Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi sentenced by Pakistan court for 15 years LeT commander Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi was the mastermind behind the 26/11 attacks that claimed 166 lives and injured 300 others after coordinated shootouts and bombings. Iranian Supreme Leader announces ban of Covid-19 vaccines from US, UK Iran is the worst-affected hit country by the pandemic in the Middle East and the first cases emerged in February 2020 A year after Wuhan outbreak, two Chinese cities placed under lockdown Hebei province in northern China in the last week saw 17 new coronavirus infections and 183 asymptomatic cases Bangladesh demands apology from Pakistan for 1971 genocide The development comes in the year in which Bangladesh celebrates 50 years of Independence Moderna COVID vaccine gets approval in UK UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock welcomed the development and said that the approval was another shot in the arm for UK's vaccination programme YouTube removes thousands of videos posted from Donald Trump's channel Following the violence and ruckus seen at the US Capitol, earlier social media giants Twitter and Facebook on Thursday suspended Trump's accounts Don't blackmail me: PM Imran Khan to Hazara protesters Imran Khan said that the government has accepted all the demands of the minority community, except one that the prime minister must visit before the dead are buried Trump presidency set for an 'ugly ending', says former Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi The Italian said "it would be unjust and uncharitable" to deny Trump's achievements as US President, notably on the economy and on foreign policy. Amazon rainforest will vanish by 2064, new study predicts World’s largest tropical rainforest, Amazon rainforest will vanish by 2064 due to alarming levels of deforestation and droughts occurring in the region from the climate change.

Top 10 world news: Trump 'parties' before Capitol siege, Lakhvi sentenced, and more

UK on Friday approved coronavirus vaccine developed by Moderna for mass inoculation. This is a third vaccine that has got a go-ahead in UK. The government is aiming to incolute 15 million by mid-February. 1.5 million people have been given doses of Pfizer-BioNTech or Oxford-Astrazeneca vaccines since Decemeber.

Go ahead to the Moderna vaccine was given by the independent Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA)

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock welcomed the development and said that the approval was another shot in the arm for UK's vaccination programme.

"Moderna's vaccine will allow us to accelerate our vaccination programme even further once doses become available from the spring."

The MHRA was the first regulator in the world to approve the Pfizer-BioNTech and Oxford-AstraZeneca jabs, allowing the start of what health chiefs said is Britain's biggest-ever vaccination drive.

Hancock's department said the Moderna jab "meets the regulator's strict standards of safety, efficacy and quality".

Its authorisation follows months of clinical trials involving tens of thousands of people, and extensive analysis of its safety, quality and effectiveness.

England's deputy chief medical officer, Jonathan Van-Tam, called the vaccine "highly effective" and said it was "another impressive success for science".

The Department of Health and Social Care said it was 94 percent effective in preventing disease, including in the elderly.

Britain has ordered 17 million doses of the vaccine, which will be delivered in the coming months once Moderna increases production capacity, it added.

Elderly residents and staff at care homes, the over-70s and the clinically extremely vulnerable are first in line for the jabs, and the government has stepped up the programme to meet its February target.

More than 1,000 new vaccination sites, including in community pharmacies and even supermarket car parks, are expected to be open by the end of this week.

Army logistics specialists have been drafted in to help with supply and deliveries.

Britain has secured early access to 367 million doses of seven of the most promising vaccine candidates.

The Moderna announcement comes with much of Britain under a renewed lockdown to try to cut spiralling infection rates and deaths blamed on a fast-spreading variant of the virus.

A total of 1,162 new deaths within 28 days of a positive test were recorded on Thursday -- the highest since the first-wave peak in April last year.

Overall, some 2.9 million people have been infected.

Stay-at-home restrictions, which include school closures, are expected to last until at least mid-February.

"This is further great news and another weapon in our arsenal to tame this awful disease," he said.

"Moderna's vaccine will allow us to accelerate our vaccination programme even further once doses become available from the spring."

The MHRA was the first regulator in the world to approve the Pfizer-BioNTech and Oxford-AstraZeneca jabs, allowing the start of what health chiefs said is Britain's biggest-ever vaccination drive.

Hancock's department said the Moderna jab "meets the regulator's strict standards of safety, efficacy and quality".

Its authorisation follows months of clinical trials involving tens of thousands of people, and extensive analysis of its safety, quality and effectiveness.

England's deputy chief medical officer, Jonathan Van-Tam, called the vaccine "highly effective" and said it was "another impressive success for science".

The Department of Health and Social Care said it was 94 percent effective in preventing disease, including in the elderly.

Britain has ordered 17 million doses of the vaccine, which will be delivered in the coming months once Moderna increases production capacity, it added.

Elderly residents and staff at care homes, the over-70s and the clinically extremely vulnerable are first in line for the jabs, and the government has stepped up the programme to meet its February target.

More than 1,000 new vaccination sites, including in community pharmacies and even supermarket car parks, are expected to be open by the end of this week.

Army logistics specialists have been drafted in to help with supply and deliveries.

Britain has secured early access to 367 million doses of seven of the most promising vaccine candidates.

The Moderna announcement comes with much of Britain under a renewed lockdown to try to cut spiralling infection rates and deaths blamed on a fast-spreading variant of the virus.

A total of 1,162 new deaths within 28 days of a positive test were recorded on Thursday -- the highest since the first-wave peak in April last year. 
Overall, some 2.9 million people have been infected.

Stay-at-home restrictions, which include school closures, are expected to last until at least mid-February.

(With AFP inputs)

UK on Friday approved coronavirus vaccine developed by Moderna for mass inoculation. This is a third vaccine that has got a go-ahead in UK. The government is aiming to incolute 15 million by mid-February.

UK on Friday approved coronavirus vaccine developed by Moderna for mass inoculation. This is a third vaccine that has got a go-ahead in UK. The government is aiming to incolute 15 million by mid-February. 1.5 million people have been given doses of Pfizer-BioNTech or Oxford-Astrazeneca vaccines since Decemeber. Go ahead to the Moderna vaccine was given by the independent Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock welcomed the development and said that the approval was another shot in the arm for UK's vaccination programme. "Moderna's vaccine will allow us to accelerate our vaccination programme even further once doses become available from the spring." The MHRA was the first regulator in the world to approve the Pfizer-BioNTech and Oxford-AstraZeneca jabs, allowing the start of what health chiefs said is Britain's biggest-ever vaccination drive. Hancock's department said the Moderna jab "meets the regulator's strict standards of safety, efficacy and quality". Its authorisation follows months of clinical trials involving tens of thousands of people, and extensive analysis of its safety, quality and effectiveness. England's deputy chief medical officer, Jonathan Van-Tam, called the vaccine "highly effective" and said it was "another impressive success for science". The Department of Health and Social Care said it was 94 percent effective in preventing disease, including in the elderly. Britain has ordered 17 million doses of the vaccine, which will be delivered in the coming months once Moderna increases production capacity, it added. Elderly residents and staff at care homes, the over-70s and the clinically extremely vulnerable are first in line for the jabs, and the government has stepped up the programme to meet its February target. More than 1,000 new vaccination sites, including in community pharmacies and even supermarket car parks, are expected to be open by the end of this week. Army logistics specialists have been drafted in to help with supply and deliveries. Britain has secured early access to 367 million doses of seven of the most promising vaccine candidates. The Moderna announcement comes with much of Britain under a renewed lockdown to try to cut spiralling infection rates and deaths blamed on a fast-spreading variant of the virus. A total of 1,162 new deaths within 28 days of a positive test were recorded on Thursday -- the highest since the first-wave peak in April last year. Overall, some 2.9 million people have been infected. Stay-at-home restrictions, which include school closures, are expected to last until at least mid-February. "This is further great news and another weapon in our arsenal to tame this awful disease," he said. "Moderna's vaccine will allow us to accelerate our vaccination programme even further once doses become available from the spring." The MHRA was the first regulator in the world to approve the Pfizer-BioNTech and Oxford-AstraZeneca jabs, allowing the start of what health chiefs said is Britain's biggest-ever vaccination drive. Hancock's department said the Moderna jab "meets the regulator's strict standards of safety, efficacy and quality". Its authorisation follows months of clinical trials involving tens of thousands of people, and extensive analysis of its safety, quality and effectiveness. England's deputy chief medical officer, Jonathan Van-Tam, called the vaccine "highly effective" and said it was "another impressive success for science". The Department of Health and Social Care said it was 94 percent effective in preventing disease, including in the elderly. Britain has ordered 17 million doses of the vaccine, which will be delivered in the coming months once Moderna increases production capacity, it added. Elderly residents and staff at care homes, the over-70s and the clinically extremely vulnerable are first in line for the jabs, and the government has stepped up the programme to meet its February target. More than 1,000 new vaccination sites, including in community pharmacies and even supermarket car parks, are expected to be open by the end of this week. Army logistics specialists have been drafted in to help with supply and deliveries. Britain has secured early access to 367 million doses of seven of the most promising vaccine candidates. The Moderna announcement comes with much of Britain under a renewed lockdown to try to cut spiralling infection rates and deaths blamed on a fast-spreading variant of the virus. A total of 1,162 new deaths within 28 days of a positive test were recorded on Thursday -- the highest since the first-wave peak in April last year. Overall, some 2.9 million people have been infected. Stay-at-home restrictions, which include school closures, are expected to last until at least mid-February. (With AFP inputs)

Moderna COVID vaccine gets approval in UK

Sri Lanka's government has insisted on the cremation of all coronavirus victims, rejecting international pleas and recommendations from its own experts to allow the Muslim minority to bury their dead.

The announcement came despite a government-appointed expert committee noting this week that while it felt cremations were safest, burials could be allowed under strict conditions.

The government first banned burials in April amid concerns that burying bodies could contaminate groundwater and spread the virus. Experts have said these claims are baseless.

The World Health Organisation has also said that there is no such risk, recommending both burials and cremations of virus victims, but the Sri Lankan government has refused.

"This decision will not be changed for social, religious, political or any other personal reason," Health Minister Pavithra Wanniarachchi said, according to ministry officials.

Traditionally and in line with the Islamic custom, Muslims bury their dead facing Mecca. Sri Lanka's majority Buddhists, who are strong backers of the current government, are typically cremated, as are Hindus.

Last month, authorities ordered the forced cremation of at least 19 Muslim Covid-19 victims, including a baby, after their families refused to claim their bodies from a hospital morgue.

This stoked dismay and anger among the Muslim community, moderates and abroad, with the 57-member Organisation of Islamic Cooperation repeatedly expressing concern.

Sri Lanka's Muslim Council (SLMC) had earlier accused the government of trying to provoke Muslim youths into doing "something rash" with its decision on cremations, a claim echoed by Justice Minister Ali Sabry, a Muslim.

There have been ongoing tensions between Muslims and the majority Sinhalese -- who are mostly Buddhists -- since the deadly 2019 Easter bombings carried out by local jihadists.

The SLMC said more than half of Sri Lanka's 222 Covid-19 victims were from the Muslim minority which accounts for just 10 per cent of the 21 million population.

Sri Lanka's government has insisted on the cremation of all coronavirus victims, rejecting international pleas and recommendations from its own experts to allow the Muslim minority to bury their dead.

Sri Lanka's government has insisted on the cremation of all coronavirus victims, rejecting international pleas and recommendations from its own experts to allow the Muslim minority to bury their dead. The announcement came despite a government-appointed expert committee noting this week that while it felt cremations were safest, burials could be allowed under strict conditions. The government first banned burials in April amid concerns that burying bodies could contaminate groundwater and spread the virus. Experts have said these claims are baseless. The World Health Organisation has also said that there is no such risk, recommending both burials and cremations of virus victims, but the Sri Lankan government has refused. "This decision will not be changed for social, religious, political or any other personal reason," Health Minister Pavithra Wanniarachchi said, according to ministry officials. Traditionally and in line with the Islamic custom, Muslims bury their dead facing Mecca. Sri Lanka's majority Buddhists, who are strong backers of the current government, are typically cremated, as are Hindus. Last month, authorities ordered the forced cremation of at least 19 Muslim Covid-19 victims, including a baby, after their families refused to claim their bodies from a hospital morgue. This stoked dismay and anger among the Muslim community, moderates and abroad, with the 57-member Organisation of Islamic Cooperation repeatedly expressing concern. Sri Lanka's Muslim Council (SLMC) had earlier accused the government of trying to provoke Muslim youths into doing "something rash" with its decision on cremations, a claim echoed by Justice Minister Ali Sabry, a Muslim. There have been ongoing tensions between Muslims and the majority Sinhalese -- who are mostly Buddhists -- since the deadly 2019 Easter bombings carried out by local jihadists. The SLMC said more than half of Sri Lanka's 222 Covid-19 victims were from the Muslim minority which accounts for just 10 per cent of the 21 million population.

Sri Lanka to continue to cremate Muslim Covid-19 victims despite uproar

Australia is on course to begin administering the first COVID-19 vaccines in February, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Thursday.

Morrison said Australia's pharmaceutical regulator is expected to approve the use of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine by the end of January, with the first doses issued within weeks.

"We are now in a position where believe we will be able to commence vaccinations in mid-to-late February," Morrison told reporters in Canberra.

Morrison said regulatory approval of the AstraZeneca vaccine is expected in February.

Australia earlier this week said it expected to begin COVID-19 vaccinations in March.

Australia has reported a total of just over 28,500 COVID-19 cases and 909 deaths since the pandemic began, with border closures and speedy tracking systems helping keep numbers relatively low.

Authorities are trying to contain new virus clusters in its largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne.

The most populous state New South Wales, the epicentre of the country's latest outbreak, on Thursday said it recorded zero local COVID-19 infections in the past 24 hours.

Australia has ordered 10 million doses of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine. It has also struck a deal with AstraZeneca PLC that sees the vaccine produced locally.

Morrison said Australia aims to vaccinate 80,000 people each week. This would then be expanded in the following four to six weeks, and by the end of March 4 million people could be vaccinated.

Australia's national cabinet will meet a month earlier than scheduled on Friday, Morrison said, as authorities seek to stop the spread of a more contagious variant of COVID-19 that emerged in Britain. A handful of international arrivals in Australia have tested positive to the UK-strain.

The cabinet meeting will consider a proposals to strengthen travel rules for its citizens and residents returning from overseas, Morrison wrote in a Facebook post late Wednesday.

(with inputs)

Australia is on course to begin administering the first COVID-19 vaccines in February, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Thursday. Morrison said Australia's pharmaceutical regulator is expected to approve the use of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine by the end of January, with the first doses issued within weeks.

Australia is on course to begin administering the first COVID-19 vaccines in February, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Thursday. Morrison said Australia's pharmaceutical regulator is expected to approve the use of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine by the end of January, with the first doses issued within weeks. "We are now in a position where believe we will be able to commence vaccinations in mid-to-late February," Morrison told reporters in Canberra. Morrison said regulatory approval of the AstraZeneca vaccine is expected in February. Australia earlier this week said it expected to begin COVID-19 vaccinations in March. Australia has reported a total of just over 28,500 COVID-19 cases and 909 deaths since the pandemic began, with border closures and speedy tracking systems helping keep numbers relatively low. Authorities are trying to contain new virus clusters in its largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne. The most populous state New South Wales, the epicentre of the country's latest outbreak, on Thursday said it recorded zero local COVID-19 infections in the past 24 hours. Australia has ordered 10 million doses of Pfizer's COVID-19 vaccine. It has also struck a deal with AstraZeneca PLC that sees the vaccine produced locally. Morrison said Australia aims to vaccinate 80,000 people each week. This would then be expanded in the following four to six weeks, and by the end of March 4 million people could be vaccinated. Australia's national cabinet will meet a month earlier than scheduled on Friday, Morrison said, as authorities seek to stop the spread of a more contagious variant of COVID-19 that emerged in Britain. A handful of international arrivals in Australia have tested positive to the UK-strain. The cabinet meeting will consider a proposals to strengthen travel rules for its citizens and residents returning from overseas, Morrison wrote in a Facebook post late Wednesday. (with inputs)

Covid vaccination in Australia to begin in February

German pharmaceutical firms Bayer and CureVac said Thursday that they have joined forces in the development of CureVac's Covid-19 vaccine candidate.&nbsp;

Under the deal, CureVac will be able to tap Bayer's expertise and established infrastructure, according to a joint statement.

The agreement "will help us make our vaccine candidate even more rapidly available to as many people as possible," CureVac chief executive Franz-Werner Haas said.

Also, Germany's Bayer will provide access to international pharmaceutical markets as well as its global supply chain and distribution network, the tabloid newspaper reported in an excerpt made available to Reuters ahead of publication.

CureVac last month started a large Phase 2b/3 clinical trial of its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, banking on the same technology that has allowed rivals BioNTech and Moderna to lead the development race.

German pharmaceutical firms Bayer and CureVac said Thursday that they have joined forces in the development of CureVac's Covid-19 vaccine candidate. Under the deal, CureVac will be able to tap Bayer's expertise and established infrastructure, according to a joint statement.

German pharmaceutical firms Bayer and CureVac said Thursday that they have joined forces in the development of CureVac's Covid-19 vaccine candidate. Under the deal, CureVac will be able to tap Bayer's expertise and established infrastructure, according to a joint statement. The agreement "will help us make our vaccine candidate even more rapidly available to as many people as possible," CureVac chief executive Franz-Werner Haas said. Also, Germany's Bayer will provide access to international pharmaceutical markets as well as its global supply chain and distribution network, the tabloid newspaper reported in an excerpt made available to Reuters ahead of publication. CureVac last month started a large Phase 2b/3 clinical trial of its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, banking on the same technology that has allowed rivals BioNTech and Moderna to lead the development race.

Bayer, CureVac to 'join forces' on Covid-19 vaccine candidate

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Morning news brief: Updates on Covid vaccine, arrests in Hong Kong and more

Amnesty International on Wednesday called on Israel to provide coronavirus vaccine doses to Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. He said the Jewish state was obligated to do so under international law.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank, which is home to some 2.8 million Palestinians, has not publically asked for Israeli assistance in vaccine procurement.&nbsp;

Hamas Islamists, who control the Gaza strip, where about two million Palestinians live, are highly unlikely to publicly coordinate with Israel in any vaccination effort.&nbsp;

But UK-based rights group Amnesty said Israel needed to "stop ignoring its international obligations as an occupying power and immediately act to ensure that Covid-19 vaccines are equally and fairly provided to Palestinians living under its occupation in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip."&nbsp;

The PA has said Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza would be vaccinated through the United Nations-backed COVAX programme.

The Palestinian health ministry said Monday that it expected to receive its first vaccine doses next month through COVAX.

Israel began innoculating its citizens, including Israeli settlers in the West Bank, on December 19, starting with medical workers and the over 60s, and has so far injected more than a million people.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Saturday he hoped that within a month 2.25 million Israelis -- a quarter of the population of nine million -- would have received the two shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech jab needed for optimum effect.

As of Tuesday, Israel's health ministry had confirmed 451,000 cases of the virus since the outbreak of the pandemic, with over 3,400 deaths.

The Palestinian health ministry has confirmed more than 100,000 cases in the West Bank, including 1,100 deaths.&nbsp;

Israel has since withdrawn from Gaza but maintains a tight blockade on the strip, which it says is necessary to contain Hamas, an Islamist group that has fought three wars with the Jewish state since 2008.

Amnesty International on Wednesday called on Israel to provide coronavirus vaccine doses to Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. He said the Jewish state was obligated to do so under international law.

Amnesty International on Wednesday called on Israel to provide coronavirus vaccine doses to Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza. He said the Jewish state was obligated to do so under international law. The Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank, which is home to some 2.8 million Palestinians, has not publically asked for Israeli assistance in vaccine procurement. Hamas Islamists, who control the Gaza strip, where about two million Palestinians live, are highly unlikely to publicly coordinate with Israel in any vaccination effort. But UK-based rights group Amnesty said Israel needed to "stop ignoring its international obligations as an occupying power and immediately act to ensure that Covid-19 vaccines are equally and fairly provided to Palestinians living under its occupation in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip." The PA has said Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza would be vaccinated through the United Nations-backed COVAX programme. The Palestinian health ministry said Monday that it expected to receive its first vaccine doses next month through COVAX. Israel began innoculating its citizens, including Israeli settlers in the West Bank, on December 19, starting with medical workers and the over 60s, and has so far injected more than a million people. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Saturday he hoped that within a month 2.25 million Israelis -- a quarter of the population of nine million -- would have received the two shots of the Pfizer-BioNTech jab needed for optimum effect. As of Tuesday, Israel's health ministry had confirmed 451,000 cases of the virus since the outbreak of the pandemic, with over 3,400 deaths. The Palestinian health ministry has confirmed more than 100,000 cases in the West Bank, including 1,100 deaths. Israel has since withdrawn from Gaza but maintains a tight blockade on the strip, which it says is necessary to contain Hamas, an Islamist group that has fought three wars with the Jewish state since 2008.

Amnesty calls on Israel to give Palestinians Covid vaccine

Denmark said it is barring entry to residents of South Africa due to fears over the spread of a new strain of the coronavirus there.

Denmark has not recorded any cases of the new variant, which was detected by South African authorities in mid-December and has since been found in a number of other countries.

The South African strain and another which has emerged in Britain are said to be more infectious versions of the virus, and have prompted widespread concern.

Denmark's decision came into effect Wednesday and will last until January 17.

"This means that foreigners residing in South Africa generally will be refused entry to Denmark during this period," the justice ministry said in a statement late Tuesday.

The only exceptions will be for child care, family visits and for people who are sick or dying, and on submission of a negative test for the coronavirus less than 72 hours old, and for the transport of merchandise.

Denmark, which is under a partial lockdown since mid-December, has almost 90 cases of the new British variant.

It has already barred entry to arrivals from Britain except for Danish nationals and permanent residents, who must present a negative virus test.

Authorities said Tuesday they were toughening coronavirus restrictions and urged people to avoid social contacts.

"Stay at home as much as you can, don't meet people outside your household, those close to you," Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said at a press conference.

So far Denmark has suffered 1,420 deaths and almost 173,000 coronavirus cases among its 5.8 million people.

Denmark said it is barring entry to residents of South Africa due to fears over the spread of a new strain of the coronavirus there. Denmark has not recorded any cases of the new variant, which was detected by South African authorities in mid-December and has since been found in a number of other countries.

Denmark said it is barring entry to residents of South Africa due to fears over the spread of a new strain of the coronavirus there. Denmark has not recorded any cases of the new variant, which was detected by South African authorities in mid-December and has since been found in a number of other countries. The South African strain and another which has emerged in Britain are said to be more infectious versions of the virus, and have prompted widespread concern. Denmark's decision came into effect Wednesday and will last until January 17. "This means that foreigners residing in South Africa generally will be refused entry to Denmark during this period," the justice ministry said in a statement late Tuesday. The only exceptions will be for child care, family visits and for people who are sick or dying, and on submission of a negative test for the coronavirus less than 72 hours old, and for the transport of merchandise. Denmark, which is under a partial lockdown since mid-December, has almost 90 cases of the new British variant. It has already barred entry to arrivals from Britain except for Danish nationals and permanent residents, who must present a negative virus test. Authorities said Tuesday they were toughening coronavirus restrictions and urged people to avoid social contacts. "Stay at home as much as you can, don't meet people outside your household, those close to you," Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said at a press conference. So far Denmark has suffered 1,420 deaths and almost 173,000 coronavirus cases among its 5.8 million people.

Denmark bars South African residents over new virus strain

The delays caused to a long-planned mission by WHO experts to China to investigate the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic are "not just a visa issue", Beijing has said.

Talks are, however, continuing over "the specific date and specific arrangement of the expert group's visit", foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told reporters of the highly sensitive mission on Wednesday.

A 10-strong team was due to arrive in China this week after months of painstaking negotiations.

But the expert mission to China to find the origins of the coronavirus pandemic stumbled before it even began, with the head of the World Health Organisation complaining that Beijing was blocking the team from entering the country.

The sensitive mission has been beset by delays and politics, with now fears of a whitewash by Beijing.

"The issue of origin-tracing is incredibly complicated. To ensure the work of the international expert team in China goes smoothly, we have to carry out necessary procedures and make relevant arrangements," said Hua.

She said the country is "doing its best to create good conditions for the international expert group to come to China".

WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus earlier said he was "very disappointed" with the last-minute bar on entry, in a rare castigation of Beijing from the UN body.

Beijing is determined to control the origin story of the virus, which has killed more than 1.8 million people so far and laid waste to global economies.

The first cases of the coronavirus were recorded in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late 2019, prompting accusations of chaotic, secretive handling by Chinese authorities which led to its spread beyond China.

US President Donald Trump called the pandemic the "Wuhan virus".

But Beijing has so far resisted pressure for a full independent probe into the early days of the outbreak. Instead, it has seeded doubt as to whether the pandemic even started inside its borders.

The WHO mission was billed as a way to cut through the rancour and seek clear answers on how the virus jumped from animals to humans.

The origins of Covid-19 remain bitterly contested, lost in a fog of recriminations and conjecture from the international community -- as well as obfuscation from Chinese authorities determined to keep control of the virus narrative.

Scientists initially believed the virus jumped to humans at a market selling exotic animals for meat in the city of Wuhan. But experts now think the market may not have been the origin of the outbreak, but rather a place where it was amplified.

It is widely assumed that the virus originally came from bats, but the intermediate animal host that transmitted it between bats and humans remains unknown.

The delays caused to a long-planned mission by WHO experts to China to investigate the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic are "not just a visa issue", Beijing has said.

The delays caused to a long-planned mission by WHO experts to China to investigate the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic are "not just a visa issue", Beijing has said. Talks are, however, continuing over "the specific date and specific arrangement of the expert group's visit", foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told reporters of the highly sensitive mission on Wednesday. A 10-strong team was due to arrive in China this week after months of painstaking negotiations. But the expert mission to China to find the origins of the coronavirus pandemic stumbled before it even began, with the head of the World Health Organisation complaining that Beijing was blocking the team from entering the country. The sensitive mission has been beset by delays and politics, with now fears of a whitewash by Beijing. "The issue of origin-tracing is incredibly complicated. To ensure the work of the international expert team in China goes smoothly, we have to carry out necessary procedures and make relevant arrangements," said Hua. She said the country is "doing its best to create good conditions for the international expert group to come to China". WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus earlier said he was "very disappointed" with the last-minute bar on entry, in a rare castigation of Beijing from the UN body. Beijing is determined to control the origin story of the virus, which has killed more than 1.8 million people so far and laid waste to global economies. The first cases of the coronavirus were recorded in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late 2019, prompting accusations of chaotic, secretive handling by Chinese authorities which led to its spread beyond China. US President Donald Trump called the pandemic the "Wuhan virus". But Beijing has so far resisted pressure for a full independent probe into the early days of the outbreak. Instead, it has seeded doubt as to whether the pandemic even started inside its borders. The WHO mission was billed as a way to cut through the rancour and seek clear answers on how the virus jumped from animals to humans. The origins of Covid-19 remain bitterly contested, lost in a fog of recriminations and conjecture from the international community -- as well as obfuscation from Chinese authorities determined to keep control of the virus narrative. Scientists initially believed the virus jumped to humans at a market selling exotic animals for meat in the city of Wuhan. But experts now think the market may not have been the origin of the outbreak, but rather a place where it was amplified. It is widely assumed that the virus originally came from bats, but the intermediate animal host that transmitted it between bats and humans remains unknown.

Impasse over WHO virus mission 'not just a visa issue', China says

The Drugs Controller General of India (DCGI) approved the Serum Institute's coronavirus vaccine 'Covishield' and Bharat Biotech's 'Covaxin', making them India's first vaccines against the pandemic.

India: DCGI approves Serum & Bharat Biotech vaccines for emergency use

India's drugs regulator has given final emergency-use approval for two coronavirus vaccines -- Serum Institute of India's Covishield, developed by Oxford University and pharma major AstraZeneca, and Bharat Biotech's Covaxin.

The country&nbsp;is now expected to start a massive immunisation programme within weeks.

Drug Controller General of India (DGCI) chief VG Somani said both firms submitted data on their trial runs and both have been granted permission for "restricted use".

"Safety immunogenicity data submitted by SII found efficacy was 70.42 per cent. Restricted use in emergency conditions allowed. The clinical trials will continue. Covaxin has been developed in collaboration with ICMR and NIV," he said in a press briefing on Sunday.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi called the approval a decisive turning point to strengthen a spirited fight, and congratulated&nbsp;scientists and&nbsp;innovators.

He said, "The DCGI granting approval to vaccines of Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech accelerates the road to COVID-free nation."

Invoking 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat', PM Modi said it would&nbsp;make every Indian proud that two vaccines given emergency use approval are made in India.

The approval is expected to kick off one of the world's biggest vaccination drives in coming days in the country of 1.3 billion people.

The CDSCO is expected to announce the dosage and other details about the shot later. SII had applied for a two full-dose regime about 28 days apart.

The government has already been holding nationwide drills ahead of the mass inoculation drive and 96,000 health workers have been trained to administer the shots.

Somani added to reporters after the briefing that the drug regulator would "never approve anything if there is the slightest safety concern".

"The vaccines are 100 percent safe," he said, adding that side effects such as "mild fever, pain and allergy are common for every vaccine".

India has so far reported more than 10.3 million COVID-19 cases and around 150,000 deaths, though its rate of infection has come down significantly from a mid-September peak.

The country hopes to inoculate 300 million of its 1.35 billion people in the first six to eight months of this year.

SII, the world's biggest producer of vaccines, has already stockpiled about 50 million doses of the AstraZeneca/Oxford shot, which will be sold to the government at about 250 rupees ($3.42) per dose and 1,000 rupees on the private market.

A government minister said earlier the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine had been given the green light on Friday, paving the way for a huge immunisation campaign in the world's second most populous country.

India's drugs regulator has given final emergency-use approval for two coronavirus vaccines -- Serum Institute of India's Covishield, developed by Oxford University and pharma major AstraZeneca, and Bharat Biotech's Covaxin.

India's drugs regulator has given final emergency-use approval for two coronavirus vaccines -- Serum Institute of India's Covishield, developed by Oxford University and pharma major AstraZeneca, and Bharat Biotech's Covaxin. The country is now expected to start a massive immunisation programme within weeks. Drug Controller General of India (DGCI) chief VG Somani said both firms submitted data on their trial runs and both have been granted permission for "restricted use". "Safety immunogenicity data submitted by SII found efficacy was 70.42 per cent. Restricted use in emergency conditions allowed. The clinical trials will continue. Covaxin has been developed in collaboration with ICMR and NIV," he said in a press briefing on Sunday. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi called the approval a decisive turning point to strengthen a spirited fight, and congratulated scientists and innovators. He said, "The DCGI granting approval to vaccines of Serum Institute of India and Bharat Biotech accelerates the road to COVID-free nation." Invoking 'Aatmanirbhar Bharat', PM Modi said it would make every Indian proud that two vaccines given emergency use approval are made in India. The approval is expected to kick off one of the world's biggest vaccination drives in coming days in the country of 1.3 billion people. The CDSCO is expected to announce the dosage and other details about the shot later. SII had applied for a two full-dose regime about 28 days apart. The government has already been holding nationwide drills ahead of the mass inoculation drive and 96,000 health workers have been trained to administer the shots. Somani added to reporters after the briefing that the drug regulator would "never approve anything if there is the slightest safety concern". "The vaccines are 100 percent safe," he said, adding that side effects such as "mild fever, pain and allergy are common for every vaccine". India has so far reported more than 10.3 million COVID-19 cases and around 150,000 deaths, though its rate of infection has come down significantly from a mid-September peak. The country hopes to inoculate 300 million of its 1.35 billion people in the first six to eight months of this year. SII, the world's biggest producer of vaccines, has already stockpiled about 50 million doses of the AstraZeneca/Oxford shot, which will be sold to the government at about 250 rupees ($3.42) per dose and 1,000 rupees on the private market. A government minister said earlier the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine had been given the green light on Friday, paving the way for a huge immunisation campaign in the world's second most populous country.

India approves SII and Bharat Biotech's Covid-19 vaccines for restricted emergency use

India's drugs regulator is likely to approve administering two doses of the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine and another locally-developed one by Bharat Biotech, each four weeks apart, a Reuters report said on Sunday.

Experts at India's Central Drugs Standards Control Organisation (CDSCO) have already approved the vaccines and a final decision is expected to be announced by the agency's chief at a news conference scheduled on Sunday.

A government minister said earlier the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine had been given the green light on Friday, paving the way for a huge immunisation campaign in the world's second most populous country.

The process for the final approval is expected to be a formality given the urgency for a vaccine in the country with the highest number of COVID-19 infections in the world after the United States.

The other vaccine, known as COVAXIN, has been developed locally by Bharat Biotech and the government-run Indian Council of Medical Research. Citing sources, Reuters reported on Friday that the shot could be approved, though little is known about the results of its clinical trials.

The CDSCO is expected to announce the dosage and other details about the shot later. SII had applied for a two full-dose regime about 28 days apart.

India has reported more than 10.3 million COVID-19 cases and around 150,000 deaths, though its rate of infection has come down significantly from a mid-September peak. 
The country hopes to inoculate 300 million of its 1.35 billion people in the first six to eight months of this year.

SII, the world's biggest producer of vaccines, has already stockpiled about 50 million doses of the AstraZeneca/Oxford shot, which will be sold to the government at about 250 rupees ($3.42) per dose and 1,000 rupees on the private market.

India's drugs regulator is likely to approve administering two doses of the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine and another locally-developed one by Bharat Biotech, each four weeks apart, a Reuters report said on Sunday.

India's drugs regulator is likely to approve administering two doses of the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine and another locally-developed one by Bharat Biotech, each four weeks apart, a Reuters report said on Sunday. Experts at India's Central Drugs Standards Control Organisation (CDSCO) have already approved the vaccines and a final decision is expected to be announced by the agency's chief at a news conference scheduled on Sunday. A government minister said earlier the AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine had been given the green light on Friday, paving the way for a huge immunisation campaign in the world's second most populous country. The process for the final approval is expected to be a formality given the urgency for a vaccine in the country with the highest number of COVID-19 infections in the world after the United States. The other vaccine, known as COVAXIN, has been developed locally by Bharat Biotech and the government-run Indian Council of Medical Research. Citing sources, Reuters reported on Friday that the shot could be approved, though little is known about the results of its clinical trials. The CDSCO is expected to announce the dosage and other details about the shot later. SII had applied for a two full-dose regime about 28 days apart. India has reported more than 10.3 million COVID-19 cases and around 150,000 deaths, though its rate of infection has come down significantly from a mid-September peak. The country hopes to inoculate 300 million of its 1.35 billion people in the first six to eight months of this year. SII, the world's biggest producer of vaccines, has already stockpiled about 50 million doses of the AstraZeneca/Oxford shot, which will be sold to the government at about 250 rupees ($3.42) per dose and 1,000 rupees on the private market.

India likely to approve two-dose regimen for Covid vaccine, report says

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