Amid rising Covid cases, India to start human trial of second vaccine

After receiving approval from Drug Controller General of India (DGCI), the Zydus Cadila group is all set to start its human trial of India’s second possible vaccine against Covid-19 — ZyCoV-D. The trials will be conducted on 1,000 volunteers across multiple sites in the country to initiate phase 1 and phase 2 human clinical trials of possible Covid-19 vaccine in India.

India is witnessing a massive spike in the number of coronavirus cases. With over 22,000 new cases in a day, the tally has hit 723,185 and 20,198 people have died. Meanwhile, India’s coronavirus tests have crossed the one crore mark. The Union health ministry said that India’s recovery rate is now over 61%.

With a total of 5,134 new coronavirus cases reported in Maharashtra, the overall tally has reached to 2,17,121 in the state. The death toll reached 9,250 cases after 224 fatalities were confirmed. Mumbai reported 785 new cases, its lowest daily count in months, taking the total to 86,509. More than 15 lakh people have been quarantined in Mumbai after contact-tracing so far since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic. Out of these, 5.34 lakh people were identified as high-risk contacts, so far 13.28 lakh people have completed their 14-day quarantine.   

  The national capital registered 2,008 new Covid-19 cases in the last 24 hours, taking the total number of cases to 1,02,831. With 50 deaths, the death toll reached 3,165. The tally includes 7,4217 recovered/ cured and 25,449 active cases. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said that the number of ICU beds at Rajiv Gandhi Super Speciality Hospital has been increased from 45 to 200 to treat coronavirus patients.

Andhra Pradesh recorded over 1,000 fresh Covid-19 cases for the second consecutive day, taking the aggregate to 21,197 while another 13 patients died, taking the overall toll to 252. Total of 1,178 people tested positive for coronavirus in the state. In the last 24 hours, 762 patients had recovered and were discharged from hospitals in the state.

Tamil Nadu reported 3,616 fresh Covid-19 cases and 65 deaths, taking total cases to 1,18,594 and death toll to 1,636. Number of active cases stands at 45,839. While Kerala reported 272 new coronavirus cases, the state’s highest single day spike, with 157 came from abroad, 38 from other states, and 68 through contacts.