1. India’s coronavirus tally rose to 71,75,880 on Tuesday as the country reported 55,342 new infections in 24 hours, the lowest since mid-August. The country’s toll rose by 706 to 1,09,856 – also the lowest since the country reported 638 fatalities in July. India’s active cases stood at 8,38,729, while the number of recoveries rose to 62,27295. The country’s recovery rate is 86.78% and the mortality rate stood at 1.53%.
  2. West Bengal’s tally crossed three lakh with highest single-day spike of 3,631 new cases while 62 more deaths pushed the state’s toll to 5,744. Maharashtra, which is so far the worst-affected state in India, registered 8,522 fresh cases, taking the total count to 15,43,837. The state’s toll rose to 40,701 with 187 additional deaths.
  3. Drugmaker Johnson & Johnson paused advanced clinical trial of its experimental Covid-19 vaccine due to an unexplained illness in one of the volunteers. The move come over a month after AstraZeneca also suspended its vaccine trials due to similar reasons. It, however, resumed the study on September 12.
  4. The International Monetary Fund predicted on Tuesday that the Indian economy would contract by 10.3% in 2020-’21, owing to the lockdowns imposed to combat the coronavirus pandemic, PTI reported. India’s Gross Domestic Product contracted by a whopping 23.9% in the first quarter of 2020-’21.
  5. Footballer Cristiano Ronaldo tested positive for coronavirus, the Portuguese football federation announced on Tuesday. Ronaldo “is asymptomatic” and “will not play against Sweden” in Wednesday’s Nations League match, the federation said on its website.
  6. The World Health Organization warned against suggestions that herd immunity might be a realistic strategy to stop the coronavirus pandemic, saying such an approach was “simply unethical”. Herd immunity occurs when majority of a population becomes immune to a disease through vaccinations or through the mass spread of a disease.
  7. United States President Donald Trump has tested negative “on consecutive days” using a rapid antigen coronavirus test, the White House physician, Dr Sean P Conley, said in a statement released on Monday as the president began a rally in Florida. This came 10 days after Trump announced he had contracted the coronavirus.
  8. The Centre issued an advisory to the states for managing seasonal illnesses along with the Covid-19 crisis. It said that there were increasing instances of coronavirus patients contracting seasonal infections. “Given the seasonal pattern of epidemic-prone diseases observed every year in our country, dengue, malaria, seasonal influenza, leptospirosis, chikungunya, enteric fever etc can present diagnostic dilemma and may co-exist in Covid cases,” the Centre said. It added that tests must be done to detect both the coronavirus and seasonal diseases for timely diagnosis.
  9. Health Minister Harsh Vardhan said that India is likely to have a vaccine against the coronavirus by early next year and it would possibly come from several sources. He said expert groups were formulating strategies for distribution of the vaccine.
  10. The global coronavirus count crossed 3.79 crore and the toll rose to 10,82,928, according to Johns Hopkins University. The number of recoveries went past 2.63 crore.