Coronavirus pandemic continues wreaking havoc worldwide. According to worldometer.com, 181,933,945 cases have been reported so far. Of these, 166,433,947 people have recovered, while 3,940,603 people have died.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has extended the suspension on flights from 13 other countries, including India. Meanwhile, India's cargo flights, business and charter flights will be exempted from this ban. The federal aviation authority has announced this on Sunday.
In a Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) on Sunday, the UAE General Civil Aviation Authority said flights from India, Pakistan, Liberia, Namibia, Sierra Leone, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Zambia, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Nigeria, and South Africa will remain suspended due to the Coronavirus epidemic.
The current COVID-19 vaccines may be less effective against beta variant – first identified in South Africa, according to a new study. Present on the surface of SARS-COV-2, spike proteins enable the virus to attach to and enter our cells. All current vaccines are working against them.
Meanwhile, the study, published in the journal Science on June 24, used cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) to compare the spike protein from the original coronavirus found in China in 2019 with the Beta variant, and the Alpha variant first identified in the UK. Cryo-EM is an imaging technique used to quantify biomolecular structures at near-atomic resolution.
India has been witnessing a gradual decrease in daily coronavirus cases. According to the latest data from the Union Health Ministry, India reported 46,148 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours taking the cumulative count of the cases to 3,02,79,331. With 979 deaths in the last 24 hours, the death toll has increased to 3,96,730.
The country also witnessed 58,578 recoveries in the last 24 hours taking the cumulative recoveries to 2,93,09,607. With this, the country's recovery rate has increased to 96.80%. On the other hand, India's mortality rate stands at 1.31%.