Articles by News Desk

Partial relaxation of lockdown Karnataka government has announced partial relaxation of lockdown from the midnight of April 23, so as to mitigate hardships faced by the public. An official order issued by Chief Secretary T M Vijay Bhaskar explained that some select activities would be allowed outside COVID-19 containment zones. Public transportation will remain suspended till May 3. Only private vehicles with passes for emergency services and for commuting to workplaces and back, will be allowed. Construction activities will be allowed for Metro rail projects within the municipal corporations. Meanwhile, IT and ITeS (IT-enabled services) will be allowed to work…

Situation alarming in Ahmedabad, Surat, Hyderabad, Chennai: MHA The central government recently formed 10 Interministerial Central teams for spot assessment of COVID-19 hotspot districts in the country. In its statement the MHA has said, "The situation is alarming in major hotspot districts or emerging hotspots like Ahmedabad and Surat (Gujarat), Thane (Maharashtra), Hyderabad (Telangana), and Chennai (Tamil Nadu)." The statement also said that these cities have reported instances of violation of lockdown conditions posing serious health hazard and the risk of spreading COVID-19. Source: Livemint Small shops reopen in India The Ministry of Home Affairs has issued directions allowing small…

It's almost a month since Bengaluru has been under complete lockdown so as to contain COVID-19 spread. Besides, two wards have been sealed off, and 19 localities designated as Containment Zones; movement for even essential services have been restricted in these areas. With the majority of us spending time at home, have you wondered what the city looks like now? What about hyper-crowded areas like Silk Board junction, the traffic signal near St John's Medical College, and so on? Naveen Thomas Prasad, an IT employee in the city, decided to shoot what his area looked like. Here's his video, which…

COVID-19 testing scaled up The number of tests for COVID-19 has been scaled up by five times, said Medical Education Minister Sudhakar K. He said that earlier, 200-300 real time RT-PCR (reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction) tests used to be conducted in the state everyday. This has been increased by around five times, to 1500 tests per day. Given the rate at which the disease is spreading, Karnataka needs to further ramp up testing but is ill-equipped for this, said health experts. There is shortage of PCR machines, testing kits, biosafety level-2 labs, and trained technicians. Sources admitted that the…

COVID-19 updates: 228 patients in Chennai, rapid antibody testing kits reach Chennai, GCC identifies 4,787 people with coronavirus-like symptoms As of April 17th, Tamil Nadu had 1323 COVID-19 positive cases, of which 228 are from Chennai. Of the total number of patients, 283 have been discharged. Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation (Tangedco) has advised residents not to pay their bills until the lockdown ends or pay the same online. However, many residents in Arumbakkam walked through MGR Nagar, a containment zone, to pay fearing power disruption. While the movement inside the containment zone is prohibited, cops at the entry…

The COVID-19 pandemic is impacting everyone, but more so the vulnerable citizens – the homeless, migrants, destitute, those with disabilities, among others. As responsible citizens of our neighbourhood, we can support the government to avert a humanitarian crisis. Citizen Matters and Wipro Foundation are partnering to collate updates from the local community. This data will go into a dashboard that can be used by the civil society as well as the government to fill gaps in responses to the needs of all citizens. Do help by sharing this information - this form will be open for the period of the…

Tamil Nadu announced a statewide lockdown as part of a larger national effort to curb the spread of COVID-19 beginning March 24th at 5 pm. The announcement for the nationwide restrictions came into place at midnight on that date. This allowed very little time for migrants in the city to make their way back home. A large section among them was comprised of those who could not afford to stay back in the city without work, such as migrant labourers, who were stranded. The lockdown has since been extended until May 3rd.  Civil society organisations, nonprofits and philanthropic organisations have…

Bhilwara: 25 COVID patients cured, one fresh case reported  All 25 COVID-19 patients of Bhilwara are cured of the pandemic viral infection. However, on the late evening of April 9th,  a fresh positive case was reported from the town. From March 19th till April 8th, the textile town in Rajasthan had reported only 27 COVID patients. Two patients died during the course of treatment which caused panic in the state. Bhilwara was one of the first districts in India to report the outbreak. Now, chief minister Ashok Gehlot directed officials to implement the ‘Bhilwara Model’ in other COVID-19 hotspots in…

COVID-19: Hostels for quarantining, 1973 residents report symptoms, camp for migrant workers As the number of COVID-19 patients is increasing in Chennai, the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) has sent notices to 41 educational institutions like IIT-M and Anna University to hand over the hostel facilities for quarantining purposes. Besides hostel buildings, the institutions have also been asked to hand over a few other structures for use by the authorities in their efforts to prevent COVID-19. Of the 834 COVID-19 patients in Tamil Nadu, 81 are from Chennai. 1,973 residents from the containment blocks in Chennai have reported COVID-19 symptoms to…

State govt prepares contingency plan for COVID-19 Health infrastructure for COVID-19 was being prepared by projecting that the state would have 10,000 positive cases by April end, the state government told High Court on Thursday. Government said that a contingency plan was prepared after analysing infection rates in four countries - Italy, China, Iran and Spain. The court was hearing PIL petitions related to issues arising from the lockdown. Government claimed it had sufficient masks, PPE kits and sanitisers to handle the current caseload, but that it was trying to ascertain the number of isolation beds, ventilators, etc., necessary as…