Top 10 Covid updates: Serum Institute hopes to launch vaccine for children early next year, says CEO

Here are the top updates from Friday:

Serum Institute of India Chief Executive Officer Adar Poonawalla on Friday said his company hoped to launch another Covid-19 vaccine by the first quarter of 2022, reported PTI. “The Covovax vaccine for kids will be launched in the first quarter of the next year most likely in January-February,” Poonawalla said. The entrepreneur met Union Home Minister Amit Shah in Parliament for 30 minutes before the announcement.India on Friday reported 44,643 new coronavirus cases, taking the country’s tally to 3,18,56,757 since the pandemic broke out in January last year, data from the health ministry showed. The new cases are nearly 4% higher than Thursday’s count of 42,982.The Kerala government has become the first to introduce a mandatory negative RT-PCR (reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction) test for unvaccinated residents who want to visit any public place, including shops, for unvaccinated people. State Health Minister Veena George said the government had taken this decision because it was responsible to protect the people, reported the Hindustan Times.The Tamil Nadu government has decided to reopen schools for students in classes 9 to 12 from September 1, reported The Times of India. Chief Minister MK Stalin said that his administration had decided to allow schools with 50% stsudent capacity. All medical and nursing institutes would reopen from…

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