Here are the latest updates on the coronavirus disease:

  1. Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Friday announced that the night curfew timings have been revised and will now be in place between 10 pm and 6 am each day beginning Saturday, reported ANI. Sarma also said that only fully vaccinated people will be allowed to enter shopping malls, government offices, hotels, restaurants and multiplexes.
  2. The Union health ministry on Friday said that all international passengers will have to quarantine for seven days after arriving in the country. In revised guidelines on international travel, the ministry said that the passengers will have take a RT-PCR test on the eighth day of their arrival.  
  3. The Omicron tally in the country increased to 3,007 on Friday from Thursday’s count of 2,630, the Union health ministry said. So far, 1,199 patients have recovered from the infection.
  4. The Omicron variant of the coronavirus disease should not be categorised as “mild”, even as it appears to be less severe than the Delta strain of the disease, World Health Organization Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on Thursday.
  5. Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain said that the city was expected to record over 17,000 cases in the last 24 hours, PTI reported. On Thursday, Delhi had reported 15,097 new Covid-19 cases and a test positivity rate of 15.34%.
  6. The 15th edition of the Jaipur Literature Festival has now been postponed to March 5-14 in view of the rising number of Covid-19 cases, the organisers said. reported PTI. The festival was scheduled to start on January 28 and conclude on February 1.
  7. The Delhi Disaster Management Authority asked all district magistrates to number the shops under their jurisdictions by Saturday to ensure that the odd-even formula for opening of shops dealing in nonessential items is not being violated, reported PTI. 
  8. Odisha Health Minister Naba Kisore Das said he has tested positive for the coronavirus. Das said that he was asymptomatic and was under home isolation. He asked all those who have come in physical contact with him in the last three days to get themselves tested.
  9. Britain’s Ministry of Defence said that it has begun deploying military personnel to support hospitals that are facing staff shortages and extreme pressures due to record high coronavirus cases in the country, reported Reuters. Britain has been recording over 1,50,000 new Covid-19 cases each day over the last week.
  10. The current coronavirus wave in France could reach its peak in around 10 days time, said Professor Alain Fischer, an official responsible for the country’s Covid vaccine strategy. France had reported 2,61,481 new coronavirus infections on Thursday, less than the record of more than 3,32,000 set a day before that.