Coronavirus live updates: Amitabh and Abhishek Bachchan test positive for Covid, hospitalised

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor Shaktikanta Das addressed the seventh SBI Banking and Economics Conclave on Saturday amid the ongoing Covid-19 crisis. The central bank governor also spoke about on the health as well as economic crisis which have impacted the job sector badly. Read key points from his address.

India's drug regulator has approved Itolizumab, a drug used to cure skin ailment psoriasis for "restricted emergency use" to treat Covid-19 patients with moderate to severe acute respiratory distress, officials told PTI on Friday. "The approval was given after its clinical trials on Covid-19 patients in India was found satisfactory by the expert committee comprising pulmonologists, pharmacologists and medicine experts from AIIMS, among others, for treatment of cytokine release syndrome,” an official.

Dr Michael Ryan of WHO, speaking during a video panel session organized by the International AIDS Society, said world leaders grappling with the current pandemic "need to take a leaf out of the HIV/AIDS activist book" and make sure access to healthcare is equitable and evidence-based. The coronavirus pandemic, which has not yet peaked in many parts of the world, has exposed weaknesses and left billions of people without reliable and affordable access to essential health services, he said.

The Maharashtra Food and Drug Administration issued a circular on Friday that made it mandatory for the kin of patients to produce Aadhaar card details, doctors’ prescription, consent form, a Covid positive report and contact details for the purchase of the anti-viral drug remdesivir and anti-inflammatory medicine tocilizumab.

This will be the second repatriation flight arranged by the India Club, an ethnic, socio-cultural group. Over 50 of the passengers are IT employees from Bengaluru who have been stuck in South Africa after their contracts with various local companies expired prematurely with businesses scaling down operations due to the Covid-19. The Indian government has arranged three Vande Bharat mission flights from South Africa, repatriating thousands.

Among the larger states and the National Capital Territory, Delhi is the only one that has seen a decline in active Covid-19 cases over the last week. As of July 3, there were 26,304 active cases in the national capital, which declined by 18% to 21,567 on July 10 morning. At the national level, active cases increased by 21.7% during this period. In absolute terms, there are roughly 50,000 more active cases in the country as compared with a week ago.