India Coronavirus Dispatch: 18 AMU professors die of Covid in 20 days

Organ transplant recipients vulnerable even after two vaccine doses, six-fold spike in sales of FabiFlu in April, and more-news relevant to India's fight against Covid-19

In slight decline, over 366,000 fresh cases reported

India reported 366,161 fresh coronavirus infections on Monday, taking the cumulative caseload to 22.66 million, according to central health ministry data. The country saw 3,754 deaths due to the pandemic, taking the death toll to 246,116. The active caseload is at 3.7 million, while the total recoveries have surged to 18.6 million. As many as 170 million shots have been administered since the nationwide inoculation programme kicked off on January 16. Of these, 689,652 were given on Sunday. Read more

Panic in AMU as 18 professors die of Covid in 20 days

Over a dozen professors at the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) have lost their lives to Covid-19 in the last 20 days sparking panic at the university, a report in ThePrint said. The spate of deaths has lead to the administration scrambling to control the situation. The panic has also led to fears on the campus that a more virulent strain of the virus might be wreaking havoc at the university. “We have lost several of our very senior faculty members, the situation is very alarming here,” Shafey Kidwai, professor of mass communication and head of the Public Relations Office (PRO) at AMU, told ThePrint. Read more

EXPLAINED: ‘Black fungus’ in Covid-19 patients

‘Black fungus’ or mucormycosis is a type of a rare but serious infection caused by a group of moulds known as mucormycetes that are present naturally in the environment, an explainer in The Indian Express said. It mostly affects people who are on medication for health conditions that reduce their ability to fight environmental pathogens. Sinuses or lungs of such individuals get affected after they inhale fungal spores from the air.

Mucormycosis cases have risen among people hospitalized or recovering from Covid 19. Symptoms include pain and redness around the eyes or nose, with fever, headache, coughing, shortness of breath, bloody vomits, and altered mental status. Read more

Organ transplant recipients remain vulnerable to Covid even after two vaccine doses

In a study published in the medical journal JAMA, researchers said while two shots of Covid vaccine provides some protection to organ transplant recipients, it's not enough to dispense them with masks, social distancing and other safety measures, a report in The Indian Express said. This is a follow-up to an earlier study that found that 17% of the participating transplant recipients produced sufficient antibodies after just one dose of a two-dose vaccine regimen. People who receive solid organ transplants often must take drugs to suppress their immune systems and prevent rejection. Read more

Covid drug FabiFlu sales jump 600% in April

Amid the second Covid wave, the top-selling brand in the pharma retail market of India is Glenmark’s FabiFlu which is a generic version of Japanese anti-influenza drug Favipiravir, a report in ThePrint said. The drug's sales soared more than six times in just April. In March, FabiFlu registered sales of Rs 48.3 crore when India was registering around 15,000 cases daily. In April, sales shot up to Rs 351 crore as the country witnessed the highest number of infections, hospitalisations and deaths. Read more