Highlighting the role that teleconsultation has played to serve the people in far-off places as well as COVID-19 patients in home isolation, Union Health Minister Mansukh Mandaviya on Friday asked the States and the Union Territories to focus more on such services for better public health management.

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The country recorded 2,24,542 new COVID-19 cases on Friday. The total number of infections have crossed 4.07 crore.

You can track coronavirus cases, deaths and testing rates at the national and State levels here. A list of State Helpline numbers is available as well.

Here are the updates:

Karnataka

How widespread is Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 in Karnataka now?

While the second wave of COVID-19 was largely driven by the more virulent Delta variant and its sub-lineages with 90.7% of the total 5,659 samples sequenced testing positive for it, 26% of the total 1,853 samples sequenced in the third wave in January were found to have Delta, according to data released from the State Government.

International

Merck says Covid pill ‘active’ against Omicron

Merck’s anti-Covid pill remains “active” against the Omicron variant, the US drugmaker said Friday, citing results from six laboratory studies.

The oral treatment, called molnupiravir, is taken within five days of symptom onset and was shown in a pre-Omicron trial of 1,400 participants to reduce Covid hospitalizations and deaths by 30 percent among at-risk people. -AFP

International

U.S. sends 7.4 million Covid vaccine doses to Bangladesh

The United States began shipping another 7.4 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines to Bangladesh on Friday, a US official told AFP.

“Thanks to the US commitment to playing a leading role in ending the pandemic everywhere, the United States is shipping 7,434,180 doses of Pfizer vaccine to Bangladesh,” a White House official said, asking not to be identified. -AFP

Rajasthan

Rajasthan schools to begin opening from Feb 1

Schools will open for class 10-12 from February 1 in Rajasthan and for classes 6-9 from February 10, the government said on Friday in its new COVID guidelines.

Students will continue to have the option of online education, it said.

Markets, other business establishments in the state, will now be able to stay open till 10 pm, while Sunday’s public discipline curfew has been abolished. -PTI

New Delhi

Delhi Metro services to resume as per regular timetable on weekends from Saturday

Delhi Metro services on weekends will be resumed as per regular timetable from Saturday in view of the ease in restrictions due to improvement in Covid situation in the city, officials said.

Weekend curfew was imposed in Delhi from January 8 onwards, following which services had been curtailed.

The Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) on Thursday had decided to lift weekend curfew and the odd-even system of opening non-essential shops in the city besides allowing restaurants, bars, cinema halls and theatres to reopen with 50% capacity, given the improving Covid situation. -PTI

Haryana

Haryana allows opening of cinema halls, theatres, multiplexes with 50% seating capacity

The Haryana government on Friday eased some Covid-related restrictions in the state, allowing the opening of all cinema halls, theatres and multiplexes with 50 percent seating capacity, a government order said.

“All cinema halls, theatres, multiplexes are allowed to open with 50 percent seating capacity while adopting requisite social distancing norms, regular sanitisation and Covid-19 appropriate behavioural norms,” as per the order issued by the Haryana State Disaster Management Authority (HSDMA). -PTI

Gujarat

Night curfew extended in 27 Gujarat cities till February 4

Night curfew imposed in 27 cities in Gujarat to curb the coronavirus pandemic has been extended till February 4, an official said on Friday.

The decision to extend the date of the night curfew was taken by Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel during a core committee meeting in Gandhinagar, a release said, adding that though number of new coronavirus cases were declining in Gujarat, 12,131 persons were found infected during the last 24 hours. -PTI