Day: January 2, 2021

LIFE AFTER COVID: THE NEW NORMAL

The government of Kerala has decided to reopen schools, colleges and movie theatres in the state starting from the first week of January 2021 as the final phase of unlocking process of the lockdown imposed due to the COVID 19 pandemic. Schools and colleges were among those institutions which were closed down earlier in March 2020 even before the lockdown was declared and movie theatres were closed down when the Prime Minister affirmed a nationwide lockdown on 24th March 2020.

The reopening of schools on 1st of January strictly adhering to the COVID 19 protocols is the initial step towards unlocking in the education sector. With limited hours of functioning, the classes for 10th and 12th standard would begin with a restricted number of students. Only 50 per cent of students will be allowed at a time and in schools having more than 300 students, the number will be reduced to 25 per cent as per directions from the General Education Department. The school management is supposed to ensure safety by providing masks, sanitisers, soap, digital thermometer etc in the institutions. Social distancing has to be maintained and if necessary, the classes will be conducted in shifts. Each school should constitute a COVID-19 cell, chaired by the principal or headmaster. The cell should meet once a week to review the situation.

The colleges will be reopened for final year graduates, postgraduates and research scholars with a limited number of students similar to schools. Students, teachers and other staff with COVID-19 symptoms and those in quarantine should complete the days stipulated by the Health Department. The premises of the institution, furniture, stationery, staff room, water tank, kitchen, canteen, laboratory, library, and toilets should be disinfected before reopening. Each student is ensured to have five class hours in college as the government is putting efforts to compensate for the time lost owing to the pandemic. Online classes will be continued for the rest of the students.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has announced that the movie theatres can function from the 5th of January 2021 which was shut down for almost a year though film shootings have resumed in the state by June 2020. All COVID 19 restrictions issued by the health department have to be followed with a 50 per cent occupancy of seats. Stringent measures will be taken against the theatres violating the prescribed protocols. Fifty per cent occupancy, staggered show timings, social distancing, thermal screening, adequate protection gear for the staff, and compulsorily providing phone numbers for “contact tracing” were some of the changes that were called for.

Even though we’ve entered into the final phase of unlocking, the government is directing adequate safety measures to prevent another wave of the pandemic. The tourism, entertainment, sports and education sectors have started their path back to normal. With the COVID 19 vaccine expected to be made available in the next two weeks, the government is expecting things to get normal in the coming months.

LESSONS COVID-19 ERA HAS TAUGHT US !!

We all thought this was a temporary thing. But here we are. People are already calling this the “COVID era” as if they are reading about it in a history book. But we’re still going through it. For most of my friends and family, the social distancing and handwashing aren’t that bad. We got used to that stuff quickly. The tough part about this era is that life has changed permanently for many folks. 

Rifts are created between people with different beliefs on wearing a mask. Complete industries are swept away and will probably never be the same. The world has truly changed. In this article, I’m sharing certain lessons I’ve learned from observing all these changes. Hopefully, these short reminders will make life during this era easier for all of us.

  1. It’s hard on everybody
    I know your life is hard. But so is the life of your neighbor. That puts us all in the same boat. So go easy on yourself and others.
  2. Nothing is forever
    It seems like this will last forever. But everything dies. And so will pandemics.
  3. Accept it as if you chose this
    This is the only form of useful lying in the world. Trick yourself into believing you wanted a more tranquil and solitary life.Simply accept everything that’s outside of your control as something you wanted. Life will be a lot rosier.
  4. Make the best of your time
    Accepting circumstances doesn’t mean we give up. Make the best of it. To be clear: Worrying and thinking about stuff that’s outside of your control is NOT a good use of your time.
  5. Take a breather
    Literally. Take a moment for yourself and breeeeath…. Aaaah. Yes, that’s the feeling.
  6. Exercise every day
    Stay in shape. If you’re not injured or ill, it’s your duty to take care of your body. Never take this lightly. 
  7. Get off social media
    It’s a waste of your time. “Always?” Pretty much.
  8. Read books
    This is a better use of your time. We all have reading lists with hundreds of books on them. And we’re not going to live 200 years. That means you need to make some tough choices. Which books will you read before you die?
  9. Learn new skills
    Technology is improving and changing so fast that we’re not aware what’s going on. We just learn it after the fact. But that’s too late. So stay on top of your field and keep learning new skills you need to do good work.
  10. Keep a daily journal
    This will probably be one of the weirdest times of our lives. Don’t you want to document this? Even if you never read it again, it’s still worth writing because it makes you a better thinker. 
  11. Inspiration comes from within
    “I need to go to Paris for inspiration.” Replace Paris with any city or place in the world. Why do we think inspiration comes from the outside? Look inside!
  12. Good food improves your mood
    One of the few pleasures that you never get used to. Research new recipes, be creative, and cook food that makes you go, “Hmmmmnn.”
  13. Objects will not make you happy -I had to tell myself that after a few too many useless purchases.
  14. More money is not the answer
    Look, I’m not going to lie. Having a little bit of money will lighten the load. So start that online business or side-gig you’ve been thinking about. But don’t expect that money will make you happy. It just solves your money problems. Nothing else.
  15. Do work you enjoy
    Just because you need to survive, don’t say yes to the first available job you encounter. And also don’t start some kind of soulless online business so you can make a few bucks. Find something you enjoy and pays the bills. 
  16. Appreciate what you have
    The grass is always greener. We tend to forget. So here’s a reminder: If you’re reading this on your smartphone in the comfort of your house, your life isn’t so bad. 
  17. Give back
    Do something altruistic. Talk to your elderly neighbors, hold the door for someone, share your hard-earned lessons with others. Small things that have a positive impact on people.
  18. Change is good
    This is a difficult period if your industry got swept away. But remember, change is a part of life. And in the long-term, it’s good. We just don’t see the sunshine when we’re going through a storm. 
  19. Stop consuming—Start creating -The world never changed for the better by doing nothing. Right now, our biggest challenge is paralysis by consumption. We’re over-consuming everything: News, food, clothes, entertainment, you name it.

To get through this era, we need more action. So stop sitting there and go create something. Without creation, there’s no progress.

Government decides to resume flights between India and UK from 8th January

Government has decided to resume flights between India and the UK from the 8th of this month. These services were suspended last month to prevent the spread of a new variant of Covid-19 discovered recently in the UK.

Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri said only 30 flights per week will operate between India and the UK till January 23. Indian and UK carriers will each be operating 15 flights per week during this period to and from Delhi, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad only.

Over 60 passenger flights per week were flying between India and the UK in December. But the Civil Aviation Ministry suspended all passenger flights connecting the two countries from December 23. Several countries had also suspended flight services to the UK in the wake of the new Covid-19 strain.

Centre extends Disability Compensation to all serving employees, if they get disabled in line of duty

Centre has decided to extend Disability Compensation to all serving employees, if they get disabled in the line of duty while performing their service and are retained in service in spite of such disablement.

This was announced by Minister of State for Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions Jitendra Singh yesterday. He said, the move will particularly provide a huge relief to young Central Armed Police Force (CAPF) personnel like CRPF, BSF and CISF since disability in performance of duties is generally reported in their case due to constraints of job requirement as well as hostile or difficult work-environment.

Dr Singh said, Narendra Modi Government is making all efforts to simplify the rules and to do away with discriminatory clauses. The ultimate objective of all these new initiatives is to provide ease of living for the government servants even after they have superannuated and become pensioners or family pensioners or elder citizens.

In another employee-friendly decision, the Ministry of Personnel recently did away with minimum qualifying service of 10 years for pension, if a government servant is incapacitated due to bodily or medical infirmity and retired from government service.

Accordingly, the rule was amended to provide Invalid Pension at 50 per cent of the last pay, even if the employee had not completed minimum qualifying service of 10 years.

In addition to these, in yet another reform in the Pension Rules, a decision was also taken to amend the rule and provide pension at enhanced rate to the family of an employee who died during service before completing the requisite service of minimum seven years.

As a result, now the family pension of 50 per cent of the last pay is also admissible to the family of employees who die even before completing seven years of service.

Covid-19 recovery rate improves to 96.12 per cent

India crossed yet another significant milestone in its fight against COVID, as the active caseload in the country today has further decreased to stand at 2.43 per cent. With continuous decline in the number of active corona cases, the active cases in the country witnessed a decline of nearly 4 thousand cases in the past 24 hours to stand at around 2 lakh 50 thousand.

The number of new daily cases remained below 20 thousand with nearly 19 thousand fresh cases being reported in the last 24 hours.

The national cumulative recovery rate has also further improved to 96.12 per cent with the recovery of over 99 lakh people so far. With recovery of over 22 thousand 900 people in the last 24 hours, the number of daily recoveries continue to outnumber the new daily cases. The total recovered cases in the country today stands at nearly 40 times the number of active cases.

The Health Ministry has informed that enhanced countrywide medical infrastructure, implementation of the Centre’s Standard Treatment Protocol by the States and Union Territories and total dedication and commitment of doctors, paramedics and frontline workers have led to a persistent increase in the number of total recoveries in the country.

The Health Ministry has said that this has also led to a commensurate dip in the fatality rate which stands at 1.45 per cent. It informed that 224 case fatalities were reported in the past 24 hours. 

Nationwide dry run for Covid-19 vaccination to be conducted today

A nationwide dry run for Covid-19 vaccination will be conducted today. Dry run is essentially a practice session where a sample number of beneficiaries will go through a mock immunisation process. The exercise is aimed at testing the preparedness for the vaccine rollout. Today’s dry run will be conducted across all States and Union Territories. Each State and Union Territory has been asked to conduct the dry run at minimum three session sites.

Apart from the staff of the designated vaccination centres, the dry run will see the participation of a select group of health care workers as test vaccine beneficiaries. Each centre will identify 25 test beneficiaries for the dry run.

The mock drill will ensure that phase 1 of Covid-19 vaccination goes without any glitch. The dry run will test linkages between planning and implementation and to identify the challenges. The dry run will also test Co-WIN application, developed specifically for Covid-19 vaccination drive, in a field environment.

Health Minister Harsh Vardhan chaired a high-level meeting yesterday to review preparedness for the dry run. Head of the COVID Task Force and NITI Aayog Member Dr VK Paul said that the dry run of vaccination is important to ascertain the preparedness and operational functioning of COWIN under actual circumstances.

States are also augmenting the state helpline 104 which will be used in addition to 1075 for any vaccine related query. Call centre executives have been given an orientation and capacity building training.

A two-day trial run was earlier conducted on December 28 and 29 in four states – Assam, Andhra Pradesh, Punjab and Gujarat. The planned operations and the laid-out mechanisms for the drive was successful then.

Health and Family Welfare Ministry said all states expressed satisfaction in terms of the operational approach and use of IT platform to ensure transparency and effective monitoring of vaccination processes expected to cover a large number of people across the country.

PM Modi lays foundation stone of permanent campus of IIM Sambalpur in Odisha

Today’s startups are the multinational companies of tomorrow, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said today adding that the scope of startups is increasing from farming to the space sector.

Prime Minister Modi laid the foundation stone for the permanent campus of IIMSambalpur, Odisha, via video conferencing today. Most startups are coming up in tier II and III cities of the country. From the farming sector to space sector, the scope for startups is increasing,” said PM Modi on the occasion.

The permanent campus of IIM Sambalpur will represent the great heritage of Odisha, the Prime Minister stated.

Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, India has witnessed more number of unicorns in 2020. The youth have a huge responsibility towards Brand India, he added.

Till 2014, there were 13 IIMs in India. Today, there are 20 IIMs. Such a large talent pool can help strengthen the ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’ campaign, PM Modi emphasized.

Present on the occasion, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik said, set up in 2015, IIM Sambalpur has already proved its mettle. I am delighted that the Prime Minister is laying the foundation stone for infrastructural development of IIM Sambalpur.

In just about five years it (IIM Sambalpur) has been able to cast its positive impact upon the hierarchy of educational institutions in Odisha,” said Mr. Patnaik. Odisha has a tradition of excellence in education since ancient times, he added.  

IIM Sambalpur is the first IIM to implement the idea of the flipped classroom where the basic concepts are learnt in digital mode and experiential learning takes place in the class, through live projects from the industry.

The Institute also outscored all other IIMs in terms of the highest gender diversity with 49  per cent girl students in MBA (2019-21) batch and 43 per cent in MBA (2020-22) batch, the statement said.

Odisha Governor Professor Ganeshi Lal, Union Education Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, Union Ministers Dharmendra Pradhan and Pratap Chandra Sarangi were present on the occasion.

The ceremony was virtually attended by over 5,000 invitees including officials, industry leaders, academicians and students, alumni and faculty of IIM Sambalpur.

PRESENCE OF MICROPLASTICS IN ENVIRONMENT; A RISING CONCERN

Microplastics have become one of the greatest threats to the entire planet. Their presence has been identified from arctic snow to alpine soil in the deepest trenches of oceans. Scientists are yet to find out the impacts of microplastics in the human body but have recognized their intake by people both directly and indirectly through the food they have, the water they drink and the air they breathe.

Instead of biodegradation, plastic undergoes physical breakdown resulting in the formation of particles smaller than 5mm in size known as microplastics and particles having a diameter less than 0.001mm known as nanoplastics. Microplastics are usually discarded while washing synthetic clothes, vehicle tyres and emissions of plastic pellets from industries.

The existence of microplastics in the marine sediments and bottom-living creatures of the sea is a serious indication of the potential environmental hazards due to pollution. Once ingested by small creatures, the microplastics move through the food chain affecting the entire biodiversity and the exposure of wildlife to tiny particles of plastics can lead to infertility, inflammation, cancer etc. Studies on marine animals have reported an increasingly alarming rate of microplastics in every one of 50 marine mammals washed up on the shores. They have also been found in insects and birds. Apart from the identified health impacts on animals and marine life, very little is known about its health effects on humans.

The omnipresence of plastic in our environment is equally treacherous to humans even though its consequences are yet to be identified. Analysis of bottled drinking water across the globe conducted by WHO in 2018 has detected the potential risks of microplastic in 90% of the world’s most popular bottled water brands.

The studies conducted by WWF in 2019 shows that the average human eats around 2000 microplastics weakly and 90% of rainwater samples collected from various regions contain a considerable amount of microplastic in it. 

Reports on recent research conducted on deceased human organs have discovered the traces of numerous types of plastic in almost all major organs including kidney, lungs, liver etc and it also suggests that microplastics can persist in the human body. These harmful chemicals in plastic materials can cause adverse health imbalances including cancer, birth defects, developmental and reproductive issues, endocrine disruption, and compromised immunity.

The most shocking fact is that the microplastics have made their way into the human body, even in the placenta of several unborn children. Long term health hazards caused by extremely small particles of plastic in the placenta of the babies and their mothers is a serious concern. These particles are likely to have been consumed or breathed in by mothers that could carry chemicals that may upset the foetus’s developing immune system.

The inventions humans have made through the overexploitation of nature without taking the harmful effects into consideration now seems to bite back at them one by one as the maker of plastic seems to be made of plastic. It’s high time for us to respect nature and live within its bounds.