On March 27, the Tamil Nadu government - announced that Koyambedu wholesale vegetable market, vegetable shops and grocery outlets will remain open between 6am and 2.30pm to control movement of people on the roads
- Also, the vehicles carrying goods to Koyambedu market from other parts of the state and other states will be allowed to unload only between 6pm and 6am
- Similarly, fuel pumps across the state will remain open between 6am and 2.30pm.
- The pharmacies and restaurants, where only takeaway is allowed, can operate
through the day. - The government has allowed food delivery platforms like Swiggy, Zomato and
Uber Eats to supply between 7am and 9.30am, 12 noon to 2.30pm and 6pm to
9pm as a special case to help out elderly citizens and those who are unable to
cook
The state - has reported 9 more people tested positive for the Covid-19 on March 27, taking the total number of cases to 38.
- Of the nine, six patients had come in contact with previously positive patients.
- A 25-year-old resident of Chennai, who worked for a (Pheonix) mall in Velachery,
tested positive for the infection and admitted to Government Hospital at Ariyalur - Another patient, a 73-year-old woman from Pammal admitted to the Rajiv Gandhi
Government General Hospital and a 39-year-old PG Naturopathy student from
Anna Nagar admitted at Government Kilpauk Medical College Hospital, also
tested positive for the infection - Two contacts of Thai nationals — a 42-year-old man and 46-year-old man —and
another 61-year-old contact of Indonesian nationals also tested positive. - They are being treated at IRT Perundurai Medical College Hospital and
Salem Medical College Hospital - Two family members of the 54-year-old man who died in Madurai GRH were also
found positive for the viral infection. - Meanwhile, Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami announced that the first
exclusive government hospital for the SARS-CoV-2 patients in Tamil Nadu at
Block B of Government Medical College Hospital at Omandurar will have 500
beds with all modern facilities, instead of the planned 350. - The chief minister announced that the state has increased the number of isolation
beds to 15,000. - The Government has also appointed 530 doctors, 1000 nurses and 1508 lab
technicians through the Medical Recruitment Board.
The daily count of new Covid-19 infections in the country - zoomed past 100 for the first time on March 27, with a rush of cases reported from Kerala
- Overall, 124 fresh cases were reported from states, 39 from Kerala alone, taking
the total number to 850 so far. - The previous highest single-day count of cases from states was 99, reported on
March 23 - Kerala’s Kasaragod district reported 34 of the new cases, emerging as one of the top coronavirus hotspots.
- Kerala also became the first state to report Covid-19 cases from each district.
- Till March 27, 724 positive cases of Covid-19 were reported by the health ministry with 75 new cases and 4 deaths reported in the last 24 hours.
- Of this, 640 were active cases, whereas 66 have recovered and one migrated.
The total number of deaths stood at 77.
The National Eligibility cum Entrance Test-Under Graduate (NEET UG) 2020,
scheduled for May 3 - has been postponed to the last week of May
- The Joint Entrance Examination (Main) will also be rescheduled as the national lockdown will continue till April 15.
- The new dates are likely to be announced only after the lockdown period is over and subsequent review of the Covid-19 outbreak
India - is soon likely to participate in the WHO’s multi-country “solidarity trial” for developing potential treatments and new drugs for Covid-19
- The solidarity trial will test four different drugs or combinations — Remdesivir, a combination of two drugs, Lopinavir and Ritonavir, the two drugs plus Interferon Beta and Chloroquine — and will compare their effectiveness
- The country has stayed away so far from this multi-country trial “due to its small sample size”
- The Indian council of medical research (ICMR) is currently focusing on developing drugs using repurposed molecules than with new molecules, because new molecule research tends to take longer time.