India recorded 51,667 new coronavirus cases and 1,329 deaths in the last 24 hours ending 9 am on Friday. With this, the country’s total caseload has risen to over 3,01,34,445, while the death toll nears the 4-lakh mark. Meanwhile, the active caseload has dropped to 6.12 lakh

India said nine cases of Delta Plus variant were found in Tamil Nadu, seven cases in Madhya Pradesh, three in Kerala, two each in Punjab and Gujarat, and one case each in Andhra Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan, Jammu and Karnataka.

ICMR Director-General Dr Balram Bharagava on Friday said that pregnant women can be vaccinated against COVID-19, but more data needs to be available to decide whether children can be inoculated against the disease.

“The health ministry has given guidelines that they (anti-Covid vaccine) can be given to pregnant women. We have also demonstrated from our ICMR PregCovid registry that vaccination is useful in pregnant women and it should be given,” Bharagava was quoted as saying by PTI.

Meanwhile, as many as 48 coronavirus cases of Delta Plus variant have been detected from 45,000 samples sequenced so far in the country, with Maharashtra reporting the highest number of such cases at 20, the Centre said on Friday.

In other news, the Serum Institute of India (SII) Friday said that it has started production of the Covid-19 vaccine developed by Novavax. “A new milestone has been reached; this week we began our first batch of Covovax (a COVID-19 vaccine developed by @Novavax) at our facility, here in Pune,” the company said in a tweet.

Developed by the American biotechnology firm Novavax, Inc., the recombinant nanoparticle protein-based vaccine — NVX-CoV2373 — will be known by the name Covovax in India.

Source: The Indian Express