MCD has implemented containment measures, directing all district health officers & epidemiologists to ramp up vector control efforts. The disease claimed 10 lives in Assam in July.
Cases have been reported from Karnataka and Kerala, and at least three districts in Maharashtra — Pune, Kolhapur and Ahmednagar. Till 8 July morning, number of confirmed cases was 9.
VLA1553, commercially known as Ixchiq, has received USFDA clearance and will be launched in India — which has seen high number of chikungunya cases — after ‘regulatory talks with DCGI’.
For four years, ICMR-VCRC has been preparing mosquitoes that carry strains of a bacteria called Wolbachia, which can reduce pathogen transmission in mosquitoes.
We now live in a world order that will keep shifting. India must use this window. This also means we remain disciplined enough not to be knee-jerked into reacting to what Pakistan sees as its moment in the sun.
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