ICMR to Study Use of Drones to Deliver COVID Vaccines
New Delhi- Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) gets approval from the Civil Aviation Ministry to conduct studies on drones for the delivery of the COVID-19 vaccine.
As per the Ministry's press release, this will be a joint venture where ICMR and the Indian Institue of Technology (IIT) Kanpur will collaborate to conduct a feasibility study of using drones to deliver the COVID-19 vaccination.
The Civil Aviation Ministry has granted "conditional exemption" from the "Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) Rules, 2021" in order to continue the study feasibility study on using drones to deliver the COVID-19 vaccine. This permission granted to the ICMR to conduct the study is for a period of one year, or until further notifications from the ministry.
Keeping in mind the massive spike in the cases of the novel coronavirus which is spiraling out of control with every passing day, the government has made vaccines available to all adults for the first time.
People above the age of 18 will now be able to register via an online portal called CoWin from Saturday (April 24) onwards to be eligible for the COVID-19 vaccination which will begin from May 1. The registrations will open in the next 48 hours on the CoWin platform. As per the new policy, the vaccine manufacturers will require to supply 50% of the produce to the centre and the remaining could be sold to the state and the open markets freely. Along with the Serum Institute of India's Covishield and Bharat Biotech's Covaxin, the government will also use Russia's Sputnik vaccine. The Serum Institute of India yesterday said that the vaccine will be sold in the states for ₹ 400 and in private hospitals for ₹ 600. At ₹ 150, the price in the centre will remain unchanged. All eligible persons can apply for vaccination through the CoWin online portal or the Aarogya Setu app.
According to the updated Union Health Ministry's data on Thursday, as many as 3,14,835 fresh vaccinations have been administered in the span of 24 hours.
The Civil Aviation Ministry on Thursday also announced that it has granted permission to four city municipalities to use drones for creating property databases and electronic tax registers. The cities granted with conditional permission are Dehradun, Haldwani, Haridwar, and Rudrapur.
Meanwhile, India yet again breaks its previous day's record as it records the highest single-day spike 3.32 Lakh fresh cases of the novel coronavirus. 2,263 COVID-induced deaths have been reported from across the country taking the total tally of deaths so far to 1.86 Lakh. The number of active caseloads in the country amounts to 24.22 Lakh taking the total tally of caseload to 1.62 Crores. Today is the second straight day that India has reported more than 3 lakh cases, making it the second-worst coronavirus-affected country in the world, only after the United States of America which is the worst affected country.
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