Coronavirus wrap July 9: Govt says no community transmission in India; Kiran Bedi tests negative for COVID-19

Globally, there have been over 1.2 crore confirmed cases of COVID-19. More than 5.4 lakh people have died so far.

Moneycontrol News

July 09, 2020 / 08:33 PM IST

India has recorded over 7.67 lakh cases of the novel coronavirus and 21,129 deaths, according to the Union Health Ministry's latest update. Of these, 2,69,789 are active cases while 4,76,378 have recovered.

Maharashtra has reported the highest number of infections, followed by Tamil Nadu and Delhi.

Globally, there have been over 1.2 crore confirmed cases of COVID-19. More than 5.4 lakh people have died so far.

Here are all the latest updates:

>> The government briefed the media for the first time in over a month regarding the COVID-19 situation in the country and repeated its assertion that India is not in community transmission stage of the virus. Moreover, the government also said that the country has managed to handle the situation "relatively well".

COVID-19 Vaccine

Frequently Asked Questions

How does a vaccine work?

A vaccine works by mimicking a natural infection. A vaccine not only induces immune response to protect people from any future COVID-19 infection, but also helps quickly build herd immunity to put an end to the pandemic. Herd immunity occurs when a sufficient percentage of a population becomes immune to a disease, making the spread of disease from person to person unlikely. The good news is that SARS-CoV-2 virus has been fairly stable, which increases the viability of a vaccine.

How many types of vaccines are there?

There are broadly four types of vaccine — one, a vaccine based on the whole virus (this could be either inactivated, or an attenuated [weakened] virus vaccine); two, a non-replicating viral vector vaccine that uses a benign virus as vector that carries the antigen of SARS-CoV; three, nucleic-acid vaccines that have genetic material like DNA and RNA of antigens like spike protein given to a person, helping human cells decode genetic material and produce the vaccine; and four, protein subunit vaccine wherein the recombinant proteins of SARS-COV-2 along with an adjuvant (booster) is given as a vaccine.

What does it take to develop a vaccine of this kind?

Vaccine development is a long, complex process. Unlike drugs that are given to people with a diseased, vaccines are given to healthy people and also vulnerable sections such as children, pregnant women and the elderly. So rigorous tests are compulsory. History says that the fastest time it took to develop a vaccine is five years, but it usually takes double or sometimes triple that time.

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