Climate Trends’ air-pollution and health expert Dr. Palak Balyan warns that air pollution is “a pandemic as severe as COVID at its peak,” adding that if cities like Beijing and London could reverse extreme air pollution, Delhi too has hope and can improve its air quality.
Over 7,000 cases of the mosquito-borne chikungunya virus have emerged in China’s Guangdong province since July, triggering Covid-style containment measures, a Hong Kong-based English daily said.
Vaccine hesitancy—a reluctance or refusal to vaccinate despite the availability of the vaccine—continues to be a growing global concern, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic and fuelled by misinformation and distrust.
In response to public concerns around sudden, unexplained deaths, particularly among young adults, India’s top medical research bodies have found no evidence linking COVID-19 vaccines to such fatalities.
A 52-year-old woman suffering from tuberculosis, bronchitis, and other comorbidities died during treatment at a hospital in Indore after testing positive for COVID-19 as well.
Mandaviya, who reviwed the preparedness to counter the growing menace, asked the Helath Ministry officials to strengthen the surveillance system across the country.
However, less than half of people aged 80 and over have received three doses of vaccine. Elderly people are more likely to suffer severe Covid symptoms.
The protests are exceptional because defiance of state authority is rare in China. They are now widespread, for even the filtered flow of information out of the country suggests that thousands may have taken to the streets in cities as far apart as Urumqi, Shanghai, Chengdu, Guangzhou, Nanjing, and Beijing to voice their anger.
On Monday and Tuesday, as a large number of demonstrators assembled and filled the streets in several regions of China, the police in some places used surveillance techniques to frighten those who opposed the strict zero-Covid policy of the communist party.
The protests erupted after 10 people died and nine others were injured in an apartment fire in Urumqi.
