WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has appreciated India’s collaboration in systematic engagement of polio surveillance network across the country to fight against Coronavirus.
(Photo: AFP)
The Health Ministry on Thursday said that the confirmed COVID-19 cases in India jumped by 941 in the last 24 hours, while 37 patients succumbed to the disease in the same time period. Overall, India has 12,456 cases and 423 deaths since the outbreak of the Coronavirus pandemic.
India’s case fatality rate is 3.3 per cent and percentage of people recovered is 12.02 per cent.
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325 districts in India have no cases of COVID-19, the ministry has informed.
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Briefing on the developing situation in the country, Joint Secretary, MoH, Lav Agarwal informed that Union Health Minister Dr Harsh Vardhan and MoS Health held a video conference with the WHO on Wednesday in which micro-plan for clusters and outbreak containment of COVID-19 at district-level was discussed.
An action plan has been prepared on strengthening India’s ongoing surveillance utilizing the services of WHO’s national polio surveillance network team, he added.
WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has appreciated India’s collaboration in systematic engagement of polio surveillance network across the country to fight against Coronavirus.
In a series of tweets, Ghebreyesus said: “Great news: Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and World Health Organisation-South-East Asia initiated a systematic engagement of the WHO’s national polio surveillance network, and other field staff, for India’s COVID-19 response, tapping into the best practices and resources that helped India win its war against polio.”
The WHO chief thanked India’s Health Minister Harsh Vardhan for his leadership and engagement with the UN body to fight the global crisis.
“My thanks to Minister Harsh Vardhan for his leadership and collaboration with WHO. Through these joint efforts, we can defeat the coronavirus and save lives. Together!” he tweeted.
The ministry official further said that the focus is on ‘Make in India’ for medical supplies for tackling the Coronavirus pandemic.
Meanwhile, India has received 5 lakh testing kits, including rapid antibody test kits, from two Chinese firms. However, the rapid COVID-19 test kits procured are not for early diagnosis but only for epidemiology purpose, the ICMR informed at the briefing.
It is learnt that the Government will reportedly reject all the faulty PPE kits donated from China and ones that have failed quality checks. China, the world’s main supplier of personal protection equipment (PPE), reportedly sent some poor quality kits, which failed the quality tests.
The Government has also placed orders for testing kits from South Korea, and the consignment is set to arrive in India soon.
Th Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) in the briefing informed that 2,90,401 people have been tested till date, of which 30,043 were tested on Wednesday.
Amid criticism by opposition parties especially the Congress, ICMR head scientist Dr R Gangakhedkar said in India, 24 tests are carried out to find a single positive case, when Japan tests 11.7 persons, Italy 6.7, the US 5.3, and the UK tests merely 3.4 persons.
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