Uddhav, Aaditya meets Pawar late at night over Maharashtra tie-up

Washington, May 19: As the scientists across the world are struggling to develop a vaccine for combating coronavirus, US drugmaker Moderna announced on Monday (local time) that the phase I trial of its Covid-19 vaccine has shown positive early results.

The company is hopeful that it's vaccine could be available to the public as early as January next year. Several firms across the world are in the race to develop a vaccine for the deadly virus which has claimed over 3 lakh lives worldwide.

CNN citing Dr. Tal Zaks, Moderna's chief medical officer reported that "if future studies go well, the company's vaccine could be available to the public as early as January".

"This is absolutely good news and news that we think many have been waiting for for quite some time," Zaks was quoted as saying.

Moderna, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts announced that the vaccine developed neutralising antibodies to the virus at levels reaching or exceeding the levels seen in people who have naturally recovered from Covid-19, reported CNN.

These will be followed by phase 2 trials and phase 3 trials, which Moderna plans to start in July.

President Donald Trump had on Friday said that that the United States will be able to deliver a few hundred million doses of COVID-19 vaccine, under 'Operation Warp Speed', by the end of this year.

"I have very recently seen early data from a clinical trial with a coronavirus vaccine and this data made me feel even more confident that we'll be able to deliver a few hundred million doses of vaccine by the end of 2020 and we will do the best we can," Trump had said at a press conference at the White House on Friday.

New Delhi, Mar 25: The Indian Rail Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) on Wednesday appealed to the people not to cancel their e-tickets on their own in case of trains being cancelled by the national transporter due to nation-wide lockdown to help curb the spread of novel coronavirus pandemic.

Clearing the doubts of the railway passengers, IRCTC spokesperson Siddharth Singh said, "Doubts have been raised regarding cancellation of e-tickets subsequent to the halting of railway passenger trains.

"It may be submitted that for trains cancelled by the railways in its complete run, refund on e-tickets is full and automatic. In this case, no cancellation exercise is required to be done on the part of the user," he said.

The IRCTC official said that if user cancels his e-ticket in situations of train cancellations, there are chances he may get "less refund". "Hence passengers are advised not to cancel e-tickets on their own for those trains which have been cancelled by the railways," he said.

He also said that the refund amount will be credited to the user account used for booking e-tickets automatically and no charges will be deducted by the railways in case of train cancellation.

His remarks came as the national transporter announced the suspension of the passenger, mail and express services from March 23 till March 31. However, the railways extended the suspension of services till April 14 in the wake of the three week lockdown announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi from March 25 during his second special address to the nation on Tuesday night.

The railways has cancelled over 13,600 passengers trains across the country in a bid to combat the spread of novel coronavirus. Only freight trains are running to ensure the supply of essential services. About 9,000 freight trains are transporting essential items every day across the country.

On Wednesday, India recorded 562 cases of COVID-19 with 10 deaths.

New Delhi, May 2: With 2,293 new cases in the last 24 hours, the highest number of cases in a single day, India's COVID-19 tally reached 37,336 on Saturday, including 1,218 deaths, according to the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
As many as 71 deaths were reported in the last 24 hours.

Out of the total number, 9,951 people have been cured/discharged/migrated.

In the state of Maharashtra, the number of coronavirus positive cases has crossed the 10,000-mark with at least 485 deaths.

The positive cases in Maharashtra has reached 11,506, including 1,879 discharged cases.

After Maharashtra, Gujarat has the most number of COVID-19 cases (4,721). The state has reported 236 deaths, while 735 people have been discharged.

The Centre on Friday extended the ongoing nationwide lockdown for two more weeks with effect from May 4 till May 17 while allowing different sets of relaxations in red, orange and green zones.