'1 billion' doses live: Archaeological Survey of India illuminates 100 monuments in Tri-color to celebrate landmark achievement

Authorities reported 60 new Covid-19 infections on Tuesday, of which 56 were in Auckland, taking the total number of cases in the current outbreak to 2,158. There have been 28 deaths in total since the pandemic began and 43 people are currently hospitalised because of the virus.

Upending centuries of medical dogma, a team of South African researchers has found that breathing may be a bigger contributor to the spread of tuberculosis than coughing, the signature symptom. As much as 90% of TB bacteria released from an infected person may be carried in tiny droplets, called aerosols, that are expelled when a person exhales deeply, the researchers estimated. The findings were presented on Tuesday at a scientific conference held online. The report echoes an important finding of the Covid pandemic: The coronavirus, too, spreads in aerosols carried aloft, particularly in indoor spaces.

For the fourth day running, daily Covid cases in India remained below 15,000 on Tuesday with no indications yet of a spike in infections in the wake of last week’s festivities. The country reported 14,939 fresh cases on Tuesday. The daily count has not crossed 15,000 since 16,002 infections were recorded last Friday. Meanwhile, for the first time since April 2020, Rajasthan reported no new cases on Tuesday. All 17,241 samples collected across the 33 districts of the state tested negative for the virus.

Mumbai has had only one day of zero Covid deaths since March 26, 2020, but Dharavi — counted among the world’s densest slums — hasn’t reported a single Covid-19 death for 79 consecutive days, according to civic data.

The chances of a third Covid-19 wave appear remote under the “present circumstances” with only the Delta and its derivatives as the main SARS-CoV-2 variants in circulation and the weekly caseload dropping steadily, as per experts. Read full story

US Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer on Tuesday turned away a religious challenge to a requirement that healthcare workers in Maine be vaccinated against Covid-19, the latest such bid rejected by the nation's top judicial body. In a brief order, Breyer wrote that the challengers - unnamed plaintiffs who said they are healthcare workers and object to taking the vaccine on religious grounds - could make another request for a mandate exemption once the 1st US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on their case.

The Biden administration threatened Tuesday to revoke the authority for three Republican-controlled states to handle their own workplace safety enforcement because they have refused to adopt rules to protect health care workers from Covid-19. The threats were sent to Arizona, South Carolina and Utah as the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration prepares to adopt much more far-reaching vaccination and testing rules affecting 80 million Americans. In nearly half the states, it will have to rely on state labor regulators for enforcement

The first case of the new Covid-19 Delta variant "AY4.2" was detected in Israel on Tuesday, the country's Ministry of Health said. This is the variant that was previously detected in several European countries, the ministry noted. It was diagnosed in an 11-year-old boy, who underwent a coronavirus test at Ben Gurion International Airport outside Tel Aviv, upon his return from Moldova.