Coronavirus pandemic live updates: At 3, Mumbai reports lowest Covid death toll since March

From making Covid shots available in Left extremists-affected areas to managing crowds at vaccination sites, and lending cold chain facilities to ensuring undisrupted power supply, at least 19 ministries and 23 different departments other than the health ministry will play specific roles to ensure smooth vaccine rollout across the country.

The vaccine against Covid 19 will be provided free to most prioritised beneficiaries including one crore healthcare and two crore front-line workers, health minister Harsh Vardhan said as a nationwide dry-run to test preparedness for the vaccination drive took place on Saturday.

Veteran talk show host Larry King has been hospitalized with Covid-19, US media reported Saturday. Citing a "source close to the family," CNN reported that King, one of the network's biggest stars, has been hospitalized for more than a week at Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles.

Mexico registered 6,359 new confirmed coronavirus cases and 344 additional fatalities on Saturday, bringing its total to 1,443,544 infections and 126,851 deaths, according to the health ministry's official count.

Pune's National Institute of Virology (NIV) has isolated and cultured the new UK variant of SARS-CoV2, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) said on Saturday underlining that no other country has so far reported isolation and culture of the latest UK strain. Isolation of the virus is the first step towards expediting development of drugs, vaccines and rapid diagnostic kits in the country.

Daily deaths from Covid-19 in India dipped to a seven-month low as 216 fatalities were recorded in the country on Saturday, the lowest since June 1. Maharashtra continued to record the highest number of deaths in the country, with 51 reported on Saturday. Bengal had the second highest toll at 28, followed by Kerala (21) and Punjab (15). The daily toll continued to fall in Delhi, with 14 deaths.

In its SOP, the health ministry has mentioned that coordination mechanisms at the national, state, district and block levels have already been defined. At least four departments - urban development, revenue, PWD, public health engineering - have been told to help with the identification of Covid vaccination sites.