1) World Chagas Disease Day observed globally on 14 April
•World Chagas Disease Day observed globally on 14 April. On 14 April 2020, the world community is to celebrate World Chagas Disease Day for the 1st time. The main aim of marking the day is to increase awareness of Chagas disease and to marked as a day to spread awareness about this “silent and silenced disease”.
2) Prime Minister extends lockdown to 3rd May 2020 to combat COVID-19
•Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi addressed his countrymen and announced the extension of lockdown until 3rd of May 2020. This measure has been taken by the Government of India in order to combat the COVID-19 pandemic in the nation. The lockdown was initially implemented in India from 25th March 2020 and was scheduled to end on 14th April 2020.
•Prime Minister of India appealed the countrymen to stay indoor as much as possible to stop the outspread of COVID-19 in India.
3) AIM’s, NITI Aayog & NIC jointly launches “CollabCAD”
•Atal Innovation Mission, NITI Aayog and National Informatics Centre (NIC) have jointly launched Collaborative CAD Software (CollabCAD). CollabCAD is a collaborative network, computer-enabled software system, providing a total engineering solution from 2D drafting & detailing to 3D product design.
4) Science communication initiative “CovidGyan” launched
•An initiative “CovidGyan” has been launched by Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Indian Institute of Science (IISc), and Tata Memorial Centre (TMC). It is a multi-institutional, multi-lingual science communication initiative that has been launched to bring the scientific and factual aspects of COVID-19 pandemic outbreak on to public domain.
•CovidGyan is a hub which gathers the collection of resources generated by public supported research institutions in India, in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. The content related to COVID-19 has been presented here in the best available scientific understanding of the disease and its transmission. The contents covers a range of details about COVID-19, such as the exact behaviour of the novel coronavirus, transmission dynamics of the Corona flu and its diagnostics.
5) AIIMS set up India’s 1st remote health monitoring system in Rishikesh
•The All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) Rishikesh, in partner with BEL (Bharat Electronics Limited) has set up India’s 1st remote health monitoring system. The system is to be used in the state of Uttarakhand to monitor COVID-19 patients.
6) World Bank releases “South Asia Economic Focus” report
•World Bank has released a report titled “South Asia Economic Focus”. The report forecasts a sharp economic fall in each of the region’s eight countries. The cause of the sharp economic fall have been stated as the halting economic activity, collapsing trade as well as greater stress in the financial and banking sectors which is a result of COVID-19 outbreak. The report states that the regional growth will get dropped to a range between 1.8% and 2.8% in 2020, down from 6.3% that was projected 6 months ago.
•According to the report, Maldives is expected to be the worst hit nation along with Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Afghanistan. In the above listed countries, the full range of forecast is in negative territory. India’s economy has been expected to grow at 1.5% to 2.8% in the fiscal year 2020-2021.
7) People’s Bank of China raises its stake in HDFC
•People’s Bank of China (PBOC) has raised its stake in Housing Development Finance Corporation Limited (HDFC) from 0.8% to 1.01%. The stake raising process was done as a secondary market transaction. The stakes comprises of 17.49 million shares of the the country’s largest mortgage lender HDFC. After the transaction, the closing price of the Chinese central bank’s stake in HDFC was Rs 2,976 crore.
•The disclosure was made by the HDFC to the stock exchanges as the stake has crossed the 1% regulatory threshold.
