Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Saturday announced the extension of the state lockdown by another week till May 23. He added that strict restrictions will be implemented in the four districts of Thiruvananthapuram, Ernakulam, Thrissur and Malappuram where triple lockdown will be in force from Sunday midnight. All four of these districts have test positivity rates above 25%.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday chaired a high-level meeting on the coronavirus situation in the country and vaccination. Modi took note of reports that ventilators were lying unused in some states, and ordered an immediate audit of their installation and operation.
India reported 3,26,098 new Covid-19 cases and 3,890 fatalities in 24 hours. This pushed the country’s case count to 2,43,72,907 and toll to 2,66,207 since the pandemic began in January. There are 36,73,802 active cases and 2,04,32,898 patients have recovered from the disease so far.
Globally, the coronavirus has now infected 16.15…