3,000 cases

(ICMR).

ICMR, in an advisory, has recommended the use of a rapid antibody test in the country’s Covid-19 hot spots.

Among the states, Maharashtra has the most number of coronavirus patients, at 490 cases, and 26 deaths.

The 20-22 clusters identified or considered to be potential hot spots include Asia’s largest slum, Dharavi, in Mumbai where three positive Covid-19 cases have been detected till Friday. Although the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has said a containment plan is in place, there are concerns over the implementation of social distancing measures in the 240-hectare slum pocket of 850,000 residents.

On Friday, Tamil Nadu reported a 102-count spike in the number of Covid-19 patients, making it second only to Maharashtra. Out of these, at least 100 were linked to the Jamaat congregation.

“Today 102 new positive cases reported in Tamil Nadu, out of them 100 people had participated in Tablighi Jamaat event in Delhi. The total number of positive cases in the state stands at 411, out of which 364 had participated in Delhi’s Jamaat event,” state health secretary Beela Rajesh said.

Telangana and Uttar Pradesh, with 229 and 174 patients respectively, were among the other states to report sizeable jumps in the number of Covid-19 cases on Friday.

Kerala, which until earlier this week had the second highest number of cases in the country, is now on the fourth spot after Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Delhi. It reported a single-digit increase on Friday.

Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the nation and appealed to people to display collective resolve of the country in fighting the pandemic by lighting a candle or a lamp at 9pm on Sunday.

Public health experts have mostly welcomed the Prime Minister’s suggestion of a staggered lifting of the lockdown — but only if it is accompanied with a set of safety measures.

“Movement should be in select groups after they have been approved by the authorities. Let clusters move, like army convoys move, especially agriculture workers. It will also help contain the risk of infection. Prioritise [those] who should be allowed to move, and those should be screened before movement, even if it requires aggressive testing to know the extent of infection,” said CS Pandav, former president of the India Public Health Association.

According to Union health ministry data, laboratories across the country have so far tested just 66,000 suspected Covid-19 patients for the disease, which has infected more than one million worldwide in just over three months.

Scientists believe that mass testing, along with strict movement restrictions, could be key to breaking the chain of infection and avoid reaching the community transmission stage – a measure India is still falling short of.

“Now that we have the kits, we should be more liberal with testing. I think, by nature’s design community transmission must have started -- I would be very surprised if it hasn’t -- The number of cases are likely to surge by next week,” said Dr SK Sarin, director, Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences said on Thursday.

Mishandling this process can potentially lead to extended power outage.

“This is absolutely unprecedented. If this is effectively implemented, then we are looking at an impact of 10-15GW of load going down and coming back again which will have a very severe impact on the grid. I am not aware of any event before leading to such a sharp fluctuation before,” said Vinay Rustagi, managing director at renewable energy consultancy Bridge to India Energy Private Limited. This, Rustagi emphasised, will need careful management and planning. “They will have to judicially use hydro and gas power plants to come back and curtail risk.”

But the power ministry is confident that it can manage the situation. An official said on condition of anonymity: “We are making arrangements since the event is known to us in advance. The current peak load of the country stands at around 120GW; of this domestic household lighting comprises of 12-15GW and we will need to manage and monitor this 15GW of fluctuation.” The fact that only lights may be off, and other electric household appliances will remain operational is also expected to ensure that the dip in demand may not be as drastic as expected.

Separately, a group of ministers met at defence minister Singh’s residence. Participants included home minister Amit Shah, food minister Ram Vilas Paswan, railways minister Piyush Goyal, petroleum minister Dharmendra Pradhan, agriculture and rural development minister Narendra Singh Tomar, civil aviation minister Hardeep Singh Puri, among others. This is the third meeting of the GOM since March 25.

Officials familiar with the proceedings of the meeting said that the ministers deliberated on various arrangements being made to deal with the increasing number of Covid-19 cases as well as to ensure adequate supplies of medicine and essential commodities during the lockdown.

“The ministers were briefed that supply of essential goods was continuing smoothly and no concerns were reported in this regard. However, at certain places, issues related to scarcity of workers for loading and unloading operations have created issues and are being addressed,” an official said on condition of anonymity.

Another official indicated that the government was fully aware of the need to ensure smooth supplies for the remaining period of the lockdown and that was the focus of the meeting. “To have the support of citizens in these difficult times, we have to ensure that they are not inconvenienced. Getting food and dairy items right to the neighbourhood level is key to ensure the success of the lockdown.”

On the movement of migrant workers, the GOM felt the issue has been resolved, as they are being looked after in temporary shelters set up by state governments, news agency Press Trust of India quoted an official as saying. The GOM also appreciated the contribution, dedication and the hard work of thousands of health professionals, police, paramilitary and armed forces, and those engaged in maintaining the supply chain of essential commodities across the country.

Experts have suggested that India should continue to confront key challenges in handling the pandemic. The lockdown has not yet led to the flattening of the curve of infections — though, to be sure, this was always expected to take some more time. More worryingly, there has been a surge in cases in recent days, largely because of the congregation at Nizamuddin’s Tablighi Jamaat. Health workers have got infected — due to the absence of PPE. to Covid-19 must be cleared on a priority basis,” said a senior health ministry official, requesting anonymity.

As a result, the ecosystem is abuzz with activity.

Pharmaceutical major Zydus Cadila has already begun preclinical animal trials for two vaccine candidates, which act completely differently. “We got approvals within days. In another four to six weeks, we should have the results of the animal trials. Depending on the results of the pre-clinical trials, we will decide which to take forward and apply for approvals accordingly,” said Pankaj Patel, chairman, Zydus Cadila.

Through the week, and even on weekends, DST officials review discoveries and innovations. “We have been having meetings every day and have come up with strategies to prioritise our research work. The focus has been on developing improved diagnostic kits, looking for novel molecules or repurposed drugs for the treatment of the disease, and also developing a vaccine,” said Dr Renu Swarup, secretary, department of biotechnology.

The research group works under the guidance of the Science and Technology core group set up by K Vijayraghavan, principal scientific advisor to the government. His office has created a “S&T Core-team on Covid-19”, composed of experts who help define problems that need urgent and immediate solutions. They also work with academia and industry to help connect teams to solve these problems swiftly.

“The focus of the consortium is on better prevention of the disease by looking at vaccine development, better diagnostics, and therapy – both in terms of ancillary treatment needed and new molecules for treatment. Basically, the health care sector is currently focusing on how to deal with Covid-19 with what we have, our job is to look at what we should have and make it happen,” says Dr Anurag Agarwal, director, Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (IGIB).

Collaborations have resulted in the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) developing a biosuit to keep medical, paramedical and other personnel on the frontlines of the war against Covid-19 safe. “It has a special sealant as an alternative to seam sealing tape based on the sealant used in submarine applications. Presently, biosuits prepared using this glue for seam sealing by an industry partner has cleared test at Southern India Textile Research Association (Sitra), Coimbatore. DRDO can mass produce this glue through industry to support the seam sealing activity by suit manufacturers,” DRDO said in a statement.

The implementing agency of CAWACH is the Society for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (SINE), a Dst-supported technology business incubator at IIT Bombay, long considered India’s equivalent of Stanford for its ability to link academia with industry.

SINE is working on boosting innovations in novel ventilators, respiratory aids, protective gears, solutions for sanitisers and disinfectants, diagnostics, therapeutics, and informatics. It will offer up to 50 potential startups financial assistance for innovations that can be brought to market within the next six months.

Meanwhile, in the background, the Indian Council of Medical Research is providing technical support by validating diagnostic kits for accuracy and specificity, having validated five of 20 kits for Covid-19 testing in two weeks.

Its apex virology laboratory at National Institute of Virology in Pune has cultured 11 virus strains of SARS-COV-2. “We got lucky that we managed to grow all 11 specimens. It will have long-term implication in vaccine and drug development,” a senior ICMR official said on condition of anonymity.

ICMR is also conducting a demonstration study to know the effect of anti-malaria drug, hydroxychloroquin, as a prophylactic medicine against Covid-19. “The anti HIV/AIDS drugs that had earlier shown promise fizzled out, hydroxychloroquin is turning out to be a better option. The medicine has shown promise in bringing down the viral load, now we are analysing if it can also prevent infection in high-risk groups, like health workers,” the official said.

Essentially, no avenue is being left unexplored. But research, for all the haste these agencies are displaying now, has its own pace. “Unfortunately, science can’t move that fast, and it will take us about at least twoand-half months to three months to move from animal trials to human trials [with the vaccine],” says Bharat Biotech’s Ella.

“The drug controller is personally monitoring the situation and our team faced no problems when we approached them with the request. I must say the government is really proactive in ensuring the work doesn’t get hampered at any level” said Rawal.

In the report headlined ‘Capital catching up to handle inevitable spike’ published on Page 3 of the edition dated April 3, SK Sarin’s designation was stated incorrectly. Sarin is director of the Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences. The error is regretted.