Fully vaccinated people can attend small gatherings outdoors without masks: CDC

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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In a revised public health guideline on Tuesday, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the public health agency of the United States, said the fully vaccinated people can exercise and attend small gatherings outdoors without a face mask.

“If you are fully vaccinated against #COVID19, you can start doing many things that you had stopped doing because of the pandemic. If you haven’t been vaccinated yet, get a vaccine as soon as you can”, the CDC tweeted from its official handle while sharing a list of the activities.

If you are fully vaccinated against #COVID19, you can start doing many things that you had stopped doing because of the pandemic. If you haven’t been vaccinated yet, get a vaccine as soon as you can. See full details: https://t.co/s5kXwg65fB pic.twitter.com/fvhehUiiCi

— CDC (@CDCgov) April 27, 2021

People two weeks after their last vaccine can exercise alone or with other household members outside without a mask, CDC said, adding that such people can also gather outdoors with a small group of other fully vaccinated people or a mixture of fully vaccinated and unvaccinated people.

However, the agency did not specify the count of the small gathering.

Now the fully vaccinated people can also enjoy dining at an outdoor restaurant without a mask with friends from multiple households, according to the CDC.

The agency has recommended certain precautions for the vaccinated people, saying that they wear a mask outdoors where the risk of Covid-19 is less clear. The outdoor spaces include sporting events, concerts, parades and other crowded places.

Since in public spaces the vaccination status of other people is likely unknown, fully vaccinated people should stick with the guidance to protect themselves and others, including wearing a well-fitted mask, when indoors or in an outdoor space or venue where masks are required, the new advisory from CDC added.

More than 140 million Americans, around 42.5 percent of the total population, had received a jab of at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine with about 95.8 million Americans, around 28.9% of the population, fully vaccinated, according to the Data with the CDC.

The CDC guidelines have come just before the Memorial Day and Fourth of July parade season. President Joe Biden had earlier hoped to see enough Americans vaccinated by Independence Day in order to safely hold small outdoor gatherings. Touting the relaxation in the CDC guidelines, President Biden on Tuesday urged more Americans to get vaccinated.

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Procurement of 1.50 crore COVID-19 vaccine doses ordered for 18 plus people: TN Govt

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Procurement of 1.50 crore COVID- 19 vaccine doses has been ordered to vaccinate from May 1, people aged above 18, the Tamil Nadu government said on Wednesday. In the first phase, the over a crore dose would be sourced by the state-run Tamil Nadu Medical Services Corporation for the inoculation drive to be done free of cost to the 18 plus category of people, the government said in an official release.

”As per Chief Minister K Palaniswami’s order, all necessary steps are being taken to vaccinate people aged above 18 and upto 44 years, from May 1.”

As of April 27, 55.51 lakh people have been vaccinated and efforts are being intensified to administer jabs for people aged 45 and above, the government said.

Tamil Nadu reported 15,830 new cases of coronavirus on Tuesday, the third day the state’s fresh covid numbers hovered in the 15,000 plus range and the state’s active caseload stood at 1,08,855.

Follow our LIVE COVID-19 blog for the latest

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IPL 2021: KKR’s floundering batting faces strong DC test in Thursday match

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Kolkata Knight Riders’ floundering batting will be put to test once again as they look to build a winning momentum against a star-studded Delhi Capitals in their Indian Premier League match here on Thursday. KKR’s batting woes emanate right from the top with the highly talented Shubman Gill continuing his poor run — 89 runs from six outings.

While their bowling, especially the ’master-apprentice’ spin duo of Sunil Narine and Varun Chakravarthy, have done an excellent job in restricting the oppositions, KKR’s top-order batting has hurt them the most. Chasing an easy 124 against Punjab Kings in their last match, KKR’s top-order cut a sorry figure to be at 17 for 3 inside three overs before skipper Eoin Morgan led from the front to snap their four-match losing streak.

Against a DC batting line-up boasting tournament’s leading run-getter Shikhar Dhawan (265 runs), Prithvi Shaw, Steve Smith, and the dangerous Rishabh Pant, KKR can’t afford any more slip-up if they want to continue their ascent in the IPL points table. First-up, Morgan will have to fix the Gill conundrum. With scores of 15, 33, 21, 0, 11 and 9, the opener has failed to impress, extending his poor run of form from the England Test series.

It would not be a bad ploy to drop Gill down the order and bring back Narine to open with Rahul Tripathi, something that was suggested by the legendary Sunil Gavaskar. The top-order reshuffle may be the way forward as the likes of Morgan, Andre Russell and Dinesh Karthik looked to have found their mojo in the middle.

Thursday’s clash will see a mini battle between the Caribbean duo of Russell and Shimron Hetmyer who will be anxious to do well after the Capitals suffered an agonising one-run defeat against Royal Challengers Bangalore here on Tuesday. Chasing 172 for a win, the Capitals were struggling at 92 for 4 but Hetmyer upped the ante in the company of his captain and another left-hander Pant as the duo smashed explosive half-centuries but only to go down in a last-ball thriller.

Russell too looked in his elements when he smashed Chennai Super Kings bowlers all around the park in his 22-ball 54 but only in a losing cause. It remains to be seen who among the Caribbean duo wins the battle on Thursday. After Ravichandran Ashwin pulling out, the Capitals’ bowling got a boost from Ishant Sharma who cleaned up the in-form Devdutt Padikkal with a peach of a delivery en route to a tidy 1/26.

KKR batting will be put to test against the likes of Ishant, Kagiso Rabada and young gun Avesh Khan, while the spin duo of Amit Mishra and Axar Patel will also look to make an impact.

Also Read: Purple Cap: Harshal Patel continues to lead; Avesh Khan climbs to 2nd spot

The Teams:

Delhi Capitals: Rishabh Pant (c/w), Shikhar Dhawan, Prithvi Shaw, Ajinkya Rahane, Shimron Hetmyer, Marcus Stoinis, Chris Woakes, Shams Mulani, Amit Mishra, Lalit Yadav, Pravin Dubey, Kagiso Rabada, Anrich Nortje, Ishant Sharma, Avesh Khan, Steve Smith, Umesh Yadav, Ripal Patel, Vishnu Vinod, Lukman Meriwala, M Siddarth, Tom Curran, Sam Billings and Aniruddha Joshi.

Kolkata Knight Riders: Eoin Morgan (c), Dinesh Karthik, Shubman Gill, Nitish Rana, Tim Seifert, Rinku Singh, Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Kuldeep Yadav, Shivam Mavi, Lockie Ferguson, Pat Cummins, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Sandeep Warrier, Prasidh Krishna, Rahul Tripathi, Varun Chakravarthy, Shakib Al Hasan, Sheldon Jackson, Vaibhav Arora, Harbhajan Singh, Karun Nair, Ben Cutting, Venkatesh Iyer, and Pawan Negi. The match starts at 7.30 pm IST.

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Amazon India removes products priced above MRP from its platform

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Amazon India said it was removing listings and suspending accounts of sellers on its platform pricing their products above the maximum retail price (MRP) amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

“There is no place for price gouging on Amazon and in line with our policy we continue to actively monitor our marketplace and take necessary action including removal of listings and suspension of accounts against sellers who are selling products above the MRP, which is in violation of Indian laws,” reads a statement from Amazon India, an e-commerce giant in the country.

In February, Amazon had warned third-party sellers on its marketplace to refrain from charging exorbitant prices for face masks amid the global outbreak of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic. The company had found the cost of the facemasks was non-compliant with its pricing mechanism.

In March 2020, Amazon had also removed hundreds of thousands of “high-priced offers” and suspended accounts of thousands of sellers who were found involved in price gouging. The company was reported to have removed as many as 530,000 products from its marketplace and suspended 2,500 seller accounts.

The Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT), the apex body of traders in the country, on April 26 accused e-commerce giants Amazon and Flipkart of delivering non-essential items flouting the COVID-19 restrictions imposed by different states.

In its letter to Union Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal, the CAIT alleged that Amazon and Flipkart were taking undue advantage of the pandemic by making illegitimate financial gains by delivering non-essential items.

“In furtherance of the illegal activities being carried out by Amazon and Flipkart, they have started taking undue advantage of the pandemic by making illegitimate financial gains by supplying non-essential items which have been strictly prohibited by many state administrations due to ongoing lockdowns to prevent the spread of COVID-19 pandemic,” the traders’ body stated in its letter.

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Confident of good year despite COVID second wave uncertainty: Tata Elxsi CEO

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Tata Elxsi’s fourth-quarter earnings came ahead of analyst estimates, with margins at a multi-quarter high, and up 230 bps quarter on quarter.  Quarterly revenue was up 8.5 percent sequentially.

“Going forward there is a little bit of uncertainty with this second wave of COVID and so on but based on the order booking and the deals that we have won we are pretty confident that we will have another good year this financial year,” Manoj Raghavan, MD & CEO, Tata Elxsi told CNBC-TV18.

He attributed deal wins to the steady uptick in revenues.

On margins Raghavan said, “These are uncertain times and margins are definitely high and again the reasons are the same, we have managed to move lot more work offshore, less visa expenses, less travel, and longer-term projects, more sustainable projects so a combination of all these have helped us improve our margins.”

“But when the economy opens up, post-COVID and things are looking better, then some of these expenses will come back and so to expect that we will be able to maintain these margin levels is unreasonable,” he said.

On wage hikes and hiring, he said, “There is a war for talent there is no doubt about it, especially for skills that are in demand, especially for digital skills, and most of our business runs from cutting edge, newer technologies and so on. So definitely there will be a ‘War for Talent’ and we are gearing up for that.”

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HDFC Bank to upgrade credit card ops with modern tech, says report

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Four months after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) temporarily barred HDFC Bank from issuing new credit cards, India’s largest private sector lender is planning to replace its legacy credit card system with a modern technology platform, Mint reported on Wednesday.

Last December, the RBI issued an order asking HDFC Bank to temporarily halt onboarding new credit card customers following a series of technical glitches that the lender had experienced for two years.

Since the ban, HDFC Bank has seen its cards portfolio decline by 189,000 cards, as of February-end. ICICI Bank managed to capture 43 percent of the incremental cards issued between December and February.

According to the Mint report that cites a person aware of the matter, HDFC Bank is going to shift its credit card operations to a modern technology platform that is aimed to make the processes more efficient and cost-effective. The upgradation, as per the report, is also expected to give customers a better experience and more security.

According to Mint, HDFC Bank had started the talk with fintech companies nearly two years ago for this but the need to move to a different platform was felt with the rise in digital transactions during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“HDFC Bank is considering moving its card platform to a credible fintech company for better end-to-end processing of cards, customer experience, and security. There are many new-age fintechs that have developed a good platform for online banking, credit card issuance and management that are offering banks the option to migrate it to their platforms,” the source was quoted as saying in the report.

The bank is holding discussions with fintech companies like Zeta and Sprinklr to launch the new credit cards once RBI lifts the ban, added the report.

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KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

English data shows vaccines cut household COVID-19 transmission by up to a half

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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COVID-19 vaccines deployed in England can cut transmission of the coronavirus by up to a half, data from Public Health England showed on Wednesday, in addition to the protection the shots offer against symptomatic infection.

News research showed that people who became infected with the coronavirus three weeks after receiving one dose of Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccine were between 38 percent to 49 percent less likely to pass it on to household contacts compared to those who were unvaccinated.

The shots also stop a vaccinated person developing infection to start with, reducing the risk by around 60 percent to 65 percent from four weeks after one dose of either vaccine.

”This study is the most comprehensive real-world data showing they also cut transmission of this deadly virus,” health minister Matt Hancock said.

”It further reinforces that vaccines are the best way out of this pandemic as they protect you and they may prevent you from unknowingly infecting someone in your household.”

Also Read: Coronavirus airborne transmission: Study shows people contract virus primarily via air

The study included over 57,000 contacts from 24,000 households in which there was a lab-confirmed case that had received a vaccination, Public Health England (PHE) said, compared with nearly 1 million contacts of unvaccinated cases.

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KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Info Edge gains 3% on plans to raise Rs 750 crore via Zomato share sale

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Info Edge (India) share price rallied more than 3 percent on Wednesday after the company announced the sale of its stake worth Rs 750 crore in Zomato Ltd.

Info Edge will sell the stake in its investee company Zomato Ltd via Offer For Sale (OFS) in the latter’s upcoming initial public offering (IPO).

“This is to inform you that Zomato Limited is proposing an IPO of its Equity Shares, comprising a fresh issue of Equity Shares by Zomato Limited (‘Fresh Issue’) and an Offer For Sale by Info Edge (India) Limited (‘Offer For Sale’),” Info Edge said in a regulatory filing.

Also Read: Zomato files DRHP for Rs 8,250 crore IPO

At present, Info Edge holds around 19 percent stake in the food delivery aggregator Zomato.

At 11:50 am, shares of Info Edge (India) traded 1.96 percent higher at Rs 5,041.50 apiece on the BSE.

Catch all the latest updates from the stock market here.

Elon Musk forms several ‘X Holdings’ companies to fund potential Twitter buyout

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Thursday’s filing dispelled some doubts, though Musk still has work to do. He and his advisers will spend the coming days vetting potential investors for the equity portion of his offer, according to people familiar with the matter

KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow