India vital in bringing this pandemic to an end: USAID

An idol decorated with a mask ahead of Durga Puja in Kolkata. Pic/PTI

India is going to play one of the most important roles in bringing this pandemic to an end, United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Administrator, Samantha Power said, underlining that the country has made investments over a long period of time in expanding vaccine manufacturing capacity. India will resume the export of surplus vaccines in October under the Vaccine Maitri programme.

Int'l tourism may open soon

International tourists may be able to travel to India by October 15 and an announcement is likely to be made by the central government soon, Union Minister of State for Tourism Shripad Naik said on Saturday. "International flights have started and we have requested for charter flights to resume by a particular date so that people can book trips to India and nowhere else," Naik said.

International charter flights account for a bulk of the foreign tourist footfalls to Goa. Earlier this month, Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant had forwarded a request made by travel and tourism industry stakeholders to the Union Home Affairs Ministry urging the latter to grant permissions to international charter flights at the earliest.

India logs 24k cases

India logged 24,354 new Covid-19 cases, taking the tally to 3,37,91,061, while the active cases declined to 2,73,889, lowest in 197 days, according to the Union Health Ministry's data updated on Saturday. The death toll climbed to 4,48,573 with 234 fresh fatalities.

Over 88cr doses to states

Over 88.14 crore Covid-19 vaccine doses have been provided to states and UTs through the Centre's free-of-cost channel and direct state procurement category, the Union Health Ministry said on Saturday. More than 5.28 crore unutilised vaccine doses are still available with them.

Woman commits suicide after losing husband to Covid

In a tragic incident, a homemaker committed suicide along with her 15-year-old son and six-year-old daughter following the death of her husband in Prakruthi Layout area on the outskirts of Bengaluru, police sources said on Saturday. The deceased are identified as Vasantha, 40, her son Yashwanth and her daughter Nishvika. Vasantha had lost her husband Prasanna Kumar, a BMTC bus driver and conductor to Covid last year.

3,37,91,061
Total No. of cases in the country as of Saturday

4,48,573
Total no. of deaths due to the virus in India

3,30,68,599
Patients recovered and discharged in India as of Saturday

This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed, agencies. Mid-day accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability, trustworthiness, reliability and data of the text. Mid-day management/mid-day.com reserves the sole right to alter, delete or remove (without notice) the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever