Coronavirus highlights: Philippines detects local transmission of Omicron sub-variant
Delhi reports marginal rise in new Covid cases, two deaths
Delhi on Tuesday reported marginal rise at 393 fresh Covid cases, against 377 recorded on the previous day, as well as two new deaths, as per the state government health bulletin.
Meanwhile, the Covid positivity rate has marginally declined to 3.35 per cent and the number of active cases has also dropped to 2,910.
With 709 patients recovering in the last 24 hours, the total number of recoveries has gone to 18,72,020. The number of patients being treated in home isolation stands at 2,400.
UN alarmed as Covid spreads in N. Korea, ready to help
The UN voiced alarm Tuesday at the swelling Covid outbreak in North Korea, warning that its unvaccinated population was particularly vulnerable, and reiterated its offer to provide assistance and jabs.
The UN's World Health Organization cautioned that the highly contagious Omicron variant of Covid could easily rip through the impoverished country with disastrous effect.
And the UN rights office warned that the measures authorities are putting in place risked violating rights and pushing vulnerable people into an even more precarious situation.
North Korea Covid outbreak is 'worrying' for new variants -WHO
A senior World Health Organization official said on Tuesday that high levels of transmission of the coronavirus among unvaccinated people, such as in North Korea, creates a higher risk of new variants.
The isolated country, a WHO member, is grappling with its first acknowledged Covid-19 outbreak, fuelling concerns over a major crisis due to a lack of vaccines and medical infrastructure.
"Certainly it's worrying if countries ... are not using the tools that are now available," said WHO emergencies director Mike Ryan in response to a question about the outbreak in North Korea.
"WHO has repeatedly said that where you have unchecked transmission, there is always a higher risk of new variants emerging," he said.
5 fresh Covid-19 cases in J&K
Jammu and Kashmir on Tuesday recorded five fresh Covid-19 cases that took its tally to 4,54,153, officials said.
The death toll remained unchanged at 4,752.
Of the fresh cases, three were reported from Jammu district and two from Srinagar district, the officials said.
The number of active Covid-19 cases in the union territory stands at 50. So far, 4,49,351 people have recovered from the viral disease, they said.
North Korea's Kim Jong Un at critical crossroads as Covid-19 surges
For more than a decade, North Korea's leader, Kim Jong Un has made “self-reliance” his governing lynchpin, shunning international help, and striving instead for domestic strategies to fix his battered economy.
But as an illness suspected to be Covid-19 sickens hundreds of thousands of his people, Kim stands at a critical crossroad: either swallow his pride and receive foreign help to fight the disease, or go it alone, enduring potential huge fatalities that may undermine his leadership.