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Glenmark Pharma on Wednesday announced the launch of its nitric oxide nasal spray (NONS) for the treatment of Covid in adult patients considered to be at high risk of disease progression. NONS, when sprayed over nasal mucosa, acts as a physical and chemical barrier against the virus, preventing it from incubating and spreading to the lungs, the company claims. The company had received manufacturing and marketing approval from the Drugs Controller General of India for “FabiSpray” as a part of an accelerated approval process. the product has been launched by Glenmark in partnership with a Canadian pharmaceutical firm, SaNOtize Research & Development, a company. FabiSpray are going to be marketed at a price of Rs 850 per unit. The recommended dosage for treatment of mild Covid-19 in adults is 2 sprays in each nostril, six times a day for seven days. The spray should be used given that a registered medical practitioner prescribes it, a company official said. Last year, Cipla Health had launched Naselin Anti-Viral Nasal Spray with Povidone Iodine to shield against the novel coronavirus and other respiratory tract infections. A Phase 3 clinical test was conducted in adult Covid patients across 20 clinical sites in India, Glenmark said. The doubleblind, parallel arm, multi-centre study, conducted in 306 patients, evaluated the efficacy and safety of NONS versus normal saline nasal spray in non-hospitalised adult patients. All patients received standard supportive care in the study. The trial analyzed patients with risk of progression of disease– non-vaccinated patients, patients in the middle and older age bracket, and patients with co-morbidities. Source: TNN Agency

India on Thursday recorded 30,757 new coronavirus cases, pushing the infection tally in the country to 4,27,54,315 since the pandemic broke out in January 2020. The number of new cases was 0.46% more than Wednesday’s count of 30,615 Covid-19 cases. The toll rose to 5,10,413 as 541 people died due to the disease in the last 24 hours, government data showed. With this, active cases are now at 3,32,918, while the death toll has risen to 5,10,413. The daily positivity rate stood at 2.61%. As many as 4,19,10,984 people have recovered from the infection in the country. With all indicators signalling a steady return to the situation that prevailed two months ago, the Union Health Ministry on Wednesday directed states to ease, or even do away with, the additional restrictive measures that had been imposed to deal with the third wave of the pandemic. In a letter to chief secretaries in states, Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said it is important that movement of people and economic activities do not remain under the same level of restrictions now. Several states have already begun the process of easing Covid restrictions: After a nearly two-year-long pause, Delhi University’s North Campus and student hubs surrounding it are back to pulsing with life as colleges begin to open for offline classes from Thursday. On Wednesday, the Haryana government lifted all Covid-related restrictions in the state, officials told PTI. In Uttarakhand, the state government lifted the night curfew after over one-and-a-half months and allowed various other economic activities to resume fully following a decline in daily Covid cases. Meanwhile, the Punjab government ordered all schools to reopen for students of pre-primary to class 12. Source: PTI

The Union health ministry on Tuesday informed that India’s cumulative Covid-19 vaccination coverage crossed 173.42 crores with the administration of over 44.68 lakh doses in the past 24 hours. “With the administration of more than 44.68 lakh doses (44,68,365) vaccine doses in the last 24 hours, India’s Covid-19 vaccination coverage has exceeded 173.42 crores (1,73,42,62,440) as per provisional reports till 7 am today,” the ministry mentioned in a release. A total of 39,15,704 precaution doses of the Covid-19 vaccine have been administered to healthcare workers, 54,69,127 doses to frontline workers, 82,58,894 doses to people over 60 years of age so far, according to the health ministry. “In the age of 15-18 years old people, as many as 5,24,34,558 first dose of Covid19 vaccine have been administered and 1,64,08,841 second dose,” the ministry said. The Covid-19 tally in India dropped to below 30,000, as the country logged 27,409 fresh infections in the last 24 hours, according to the Ministry of Health and Family welfare. The daily positivity rate in the country has also dipped to 2.23 percent, while the weekly positivity rate has dropped to 3.63 percent, the Ministry informed. Source: ANI

Noting that the decision on third dose of COVID-19 vaccine for all adults are going to be taken based on scientific need, the govt. on Thursday said emerging knowledge on the topic is under its active consideration. Responding to a question at a weekly press conference, NITI Aayog Member (Health) Dr V K Paul said all decisions on precaution doses are taken first and foremost based on the necessity. “The scientific need is the first part that drives it, then other considerations — programmatic and epidemiological. just because anyone else is doing it, they have their own context, we’ve our own context and all this is under constant scientific scrutiny and decision-making,” he said. The official said additional need for vaccination and inclusion of population for vaccination is examined constantly. “we also check out developments in the world and keep analysing and all options of vaccination are under active consideration and as decisions are taken, it would be announced,” he said. Responding to a matter on vaccination coverage, Joint Secretary at the Health Ministry Lav Agarwal said though there’s variation in coverage of vaccination between different age groups, but collectively the vaccination pace remains good in the country. “In October last year, an average 77.55 lakh doses were given each day. In November, about 59.32 lakh doses were given. In December, the number was 61.91 lakh and in January, it was 69.49 lakh and in the last nine days, approximately 51 lakh doses were given on an average each day. But with 96 per cent first dose coverage and 78 per cent second dose coverage, the available number of individuals who ought to get vaccinated reduces a bit,” he said. “If we look today, we are giving 51 lakh doses on an average every day and we urge you to bring awareness among those in young adolescents who haven’t yet taken vaccination,” he added. On re-infection cases during the third wave, ICMR Director General Dr Balram Bhargava said infection with one variant doesn’t provide protection from the other variant so as variants have emerged, re-infection has been seen. “However, we’ve seen that the use of vaccination prevents severe disease and hospitalisation and death, and COVID appropriate behaviour is useful to prevent it. The biological aspects play a role from individual to individual,” he said. Paul added that re-infection cases are being constantly watched. “We have to accept this as a reality and respond to this at the personal and system level as well as at the vaccination and social vaccination level,” he said. Source: Financial Express

MyHealthcare has announced the launch of its MyHealthcare Enterprise Application (MHEA) for hospitals and healthcare institutions, taking another important step towards the digitisation and digitalisation of healthcare in India. it’ll enable clinicians and hospital teams to manage complete patient care and hospital operations, through a task-based healthcare information management system. The MHEA ecosystem has been architected to drive operational and process efficiencies across the provider network, help with the entire digitisation of the clinical, administrative and procurement processes. The MyHealthcare Ecosystem and MHEA together will offer a connected care continuum platform, driving the most effective standards in patient care. “The combined experience of the team at MyHealthcare Enterprise Application has looked at every pain point faced by hospital operations, nursing, clinical teams, and ensured that we deliver a platform that helps them in improving the way they must do their tasks and deliver better patient care. the single screen experience, with our innovative platforms will pave a new path towards enriched user experience in hospital management,” said, Diwakar Bhowmik, vice chairman and platform lead, MyHealthcare Enterprise Application. Informing that the platform will deliver better patient outcomes, Divya Laroyia, Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer, MyHealthcare, said, “The MHEA ecosystem will help deliver the best-in-class user experience for hospital operations and clinical teams. we’ve used process automation and AI to bring to users’ relevant information and enable them to finish all tasks from a single screen. in comparison to current operating standards, our analysis shows that the MHEA ecosystem will help improve operational efficiencies by an estimated 76 per cent and reduced training time by around 80 per cent.” The platform is made on an open-source stack, employing a micro-services architecture which helps reduce operating costs for hospitals. The ecosystem also helps hospitals in improving procurement efficiencies through its smart stocking platform and helps improve patient experience significantly, through its discharge process automation. Commenting on the launch Aneesh Nair, Co-founder and CIO, said “The MHEA expands this to secondary, tertiary and emergency care. Our focus in bringing the MHEA ecosystem to the market has been to ensure we are able to drive value for our healthcare partners. The technology stack we’ve chosen helps reduce a hospitals technology operating expense by over 40 per cent and delivers the best-in-class data security.” The MHEA ecosystem comes integrated across a large network of TPA and health insurance companies. The easy-to-use workflow configurator allows hospitals to configure their operating and clinical workflows, without any need for coding and development effort.

India on Saturday recorded 1,27,952 new COVID-19 cases, taking the complete count to 4,20,80,664, informed the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. The nation additionally revealed 1,059 new demises as of now taking the aggregate count of deaths to 5,01,114 due to Covid.  With this, the dynamic caseload of India is at 13,31,648, establishing 3.16 percent of the nation’s complete positive cases. The national COVID-19 recuperation rate remained at 95.64 percent while the positivity rate moreover tumbled to 7.98 percent, the health ministry said. The week after week positivity rate additionally plunged to 11.21 percent. As many of 2,30,814 recoveries were accounted for as of now, taking the combined count of recuperated patients to 4,02,47,902. A sum of 16,03,856 tests were led as of now. Over 73.79 crore tests have been led such a long way in the nation, said the ministry. With the administration of 47,53,081 antibody dosages as of now, India’s aggregate count of inoculation remained at 1,68,98,17,199 according to provisional reports till 7 am today. Source: ANI

NEET PG exam that was scheduled to be held on March 12 has been postponed by 6-8 weeks, the Union Health Ministry announced via a government circular. In an order issued on Thursday, the director of health services wrote, “I am directed to say that lot of representations were being received from medical doctors regarding request to delay NEET-PG-2022 examination date i.e. 12.03.22 as published in information bulletin by NBE since it is clashing with the NEET PG 2021 counselling. Also, many of the interns would not be able to participate in the PG Counselling 2022 by the month of May/2022.” “Keeping the above facts in view, the minister has taken the decision to postpone NEET PG 2022 by 6-8 weeks or suitably,” the order said. The Supreme Court was scheduled to listen to a plea on the postponement of the examination on Friday. The plea was filed on January 25. Six MBBS students approached the apex court as many requirements like mandatory internship etc weren’t fulfilled by many aspirants. Many internships got halted due to their Covid duty, they said. According to one among the NEET PG regulations, 30 beds of a hospital need to be assigned to at least one unit of students pursuing the PG course and now two students of two academic sessions will need to be accommodated within the same facility, the plea said. There was a delay in conducting the exams in 2021 which was due to the pandemic situation. Many MBBS graduated are yet to finish their internship, without completing which they’ll not be eligible for the entrance exam this year. The Supreme Court, on January 7, had paved the way for resuming the stalled NEET-PG 2021 counselling process based on the prevailing 27 per cent OBC and 10 per cent EWS reservations in the All India Quota seats, saying there’s an “urgent need” to start the admission process. Source: PTI

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, while presenting the Union Budget, said a national tele-mental health program will be launched for mental health counselling. IIT Bangalore will provide tech support for the programme. She also said an open platform for the National Digital Health Ecosystem will be rolled out “It will consist of digital registries of health providers and health facilities, unique health identity and universal access to health facilities,” she said. She said the government is focused on empowering the youths, women and the poor sections in the country, adding that the government’s next target is to create 60 lakh jobs. The programme will include 23 tele mental health centres of excellence with National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences (Nimhans) being the nodal centre and technology support being provided by IIT Bangalore, she added. “We are in the midst of the Omicron wave, the speed of our vaccination campaign has helped greatly. I am confident that ‘Sabka Prayaas’, we’ll continue with strong growth,” the FM said in her initial part of the Budget speech. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is presenting her fourth Budget that is aimed at maintaining the world’s fastest-growing economy tag for India. The budget comes days before the first phase of voting in Uttar Pradesh, which along with four other states is going to the polls to elect a new state government.  

Amidst rising COVID-19 cases and the discovery of new variants, Britain is reviewing its decision to make vaccine jabs mandatory for healthcare workers amidst tension of losing thousand of staff. In England, there are high tensions and concerns amongst hospitals and the government that because of making COVID-19 vaccination mandatory, they could lose tens of thousands of workers. The decision has met a lot of resistance from a significant group of some healthcare workers, with warnings that sacking those who did not comply could leave the NHS facing significant staff shortages, while a number of lawmakers in Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s Conservative party have also criticized the decision. The government also said on Monday that they have received the long-awaited report on the investigation into lockdown-breaching government parties. The Cabinet Office said senior civil servant Sue Gray “has provided an update on her investigations to the Prime Minister.” Johnson’s office has promised the report will be published “swiftly”. Source: Reuters and Associated Press  

Union health minister Mansukh Mandaviya will chair a high-level meeting today with the health ministers of southern states, Union territories to review the Covid-19 situation. He will also review public health measures taken in view of the Omicron variant of coronavirus. The Covid-19 review meet will be held virtually at 2.30pm. The state health ministers from Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Telangana, Lakshadweep, Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Andaman and Nicobar Islands are expected to attend the meeting, reported ANI citing people familiar with the matter. Senior health officials will also attend the meeting. Mandaviya held a high-level Covid review meeting with nine northern states and UTs on Tuesday where he advised to share Covid testing and vaccination data in a timely manner. He asked the states witnessing a decline in Covid-19 testing to ramp it up through RTPCR. Advising the states and UTs to ensure efficient monitoring of those in-home isolation in line with the national guidelines, the minister said, “This will ensure that the vulnerable categories of active cases in home isolation get the required medical help in a timely manner.” He reminded them to keep a close watch on the emerging clusters and hotspots of Covid-19 and monitor the trend of hospitalisations and virus-related deaths. Mandaviya said that with our past experience, ‘Test-Track-Treat-Vaccinate and Adherence to Covid Appropriate Behaviour’ along with monitoring of cases remains crucial for Covid management. In order to expedite the implementation of activities under the ECRP-II package, he asked the “health ministers and the state authorities to plug the existing gaps by efficiently utilizing the amount sanctioned for various infra projects.” Source: ANI