8th April 2020 Current Affairs in Tamil & English

8th April 2020 Current Affairs in Tamil & English

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Exams (TNPSC, SSC)

8^th  APRIL 2020

 

   TABLE OF CONTENTS    

• Govt. Mulls lockdown extension amid requests from the States
• Interpol warns of cybe rattacks on hospitals
• India lifts ban on export of Hydroxychloroquine
• Mehbooba leaves jail,detained at home now
• Delhi’s ‘5T’ war against virus
• Odisha telemedicine helpline starts working from today
• Three Manipal students win MIT’s COVID­19 hackathon
• Sonia offers suggestions to govt. in pandemic fight
• Amid lockdown in Russia, Gaganyaan trainees healthy
• Special UN session likely tomorrow
• Loss of smell may be linked to cells: study

 

Govt. mulls lockdown extension amid requests from the States :

Information in News:

The Central government is mulling extending the nationwide lockdown beyond April 14 to contain the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic following requests from several states and experts, government sources said on Tuesday.

However, sources did not indicate if a final decision has been taken on the matter, and Joint Secretary in the Union Health Ministry Lav Aggarwal said, “No decision on extending lockdown as yet (taken), please don’t speculate.”

Prime Minister also asked the ministers whether the restrictions should be lifted sector-wise or district-wise.

Reiterating that lockdown measures and social distancing norms need to go hand in hand, Modi also told ministers to popularize the Aarogya Setu app in the rural areas and grass root institutions.

Reiterating that lockdown measures and social distancing norms need to go hand in hand, Modi also told ministers to popularize the Aarogya Setu app in the rural areas and grass root institutions.

 

Interpol warns of cyberattacks on hospitals :

Information in News:

Cybercriminals targeting critical healthcare institutions with ransomware amid pandemic’

The International Criminal Police Organisation (Interpol) has warned member countries that cybercriminals were attempting to target major hospitals and other institutions on the front lines of the fight against COVID-19 with ransomware.

In an alert sent to 194 nations, including India, Interpol said organisations at the forefront of the global response to the COVID-19 outbreak had also become targets of ransomware attacks, which were “designed to lock them out of their critical systems in an attempt to extort payments”.

“Cybercriminals are using ransomware to hold hospitals and medical services digitally hostage, preventing them from accessing vital files and systems until a ransom is paid,” Interpol said in a note.

 

 

• The International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) is an intergovernmental organizationthat helps coordinate the police force of 194 member countries.
• Each of the member countries hosts an INTERPOL National Central Bureau (NCB).This connects their national law enforcement with other countries and with the General Secretariat.
• The Central Bureau of Investigation(CBI) is designated as the National Central Bureau of India.
• The General Secretariat provides a range of expertise and services to the member countries.
• It is headquartered in Lyon, France

 

Interpol also issued a ‘Purple Notice’. “At this point, the ransomware appears to be spreading primarily via e-mails —often falsely claiming to contain information or advice regarding the coronavirus from a government agency, which encourages the recipient to click on an infected link or attachment,” the agency said. It added that prevention and mitigation efforts were crucial to stopping the attacks.

Pattern of crimes

Separately, Interpol warned that with a majority of people working from home due to the pandemic, there was a change in the pattern of crimes. The lockdown period had not only led to a “significant” increase in domestic violence but made business establishments/factories vulnerable to thefts.

A spurt in drug commerce via social media/encrypted apps, fraudulent trade in personal protective equipment and anti-viral medicines, and individuals/businesses on reduced income becoming potential targets of loan sharks were among the threats perceived by the organisation.

Alert issued

Santosh K. Misra, Chief Executive Officer, Tamil Nadu e-Governance Agency and Commissioner of e-Governance, told The Hindu that

• The alerts had been received from the Government of India on the threat of ransomware/malware attacks and the same was communicated to the concerned departments.
• “Our appeal to institutions and individuals is not to open any mail or link on coronavirus data or home remedies unless it is from a trusted source like a government agency,” Mr. Misra said.
• There was also a possibility of e-mail spoofing, where a suspect operating from a remote location would send a mail that would appear as if it came from a known person, he cautioned.

 

 

India Lifts Ban On Export of Hydroxychloroquine:

Information in News:

The Government of India announced on Tuesday that it had rescinded its earlier ban on the export of malaria drug hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), which is now being used in countries such as the U.S. as a possible line of treatment for COVID-19, setting off a controversy over whether the two-day old blanket ban was overturned under pressure from Washington.

 

 

“In view of the humanitarian aspects of the pandemic, it has been decided that India would licence paracetamol and HCQ in appropriate quantities to all our neighbouring countries who are dependent on our capabilities. We will also be supplying these essential drugs to some nations that have been particularly badly affected by the pandemic,” Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Anurag Srivastava said.

In a notification on March 25, the government placed HCQ on a restricted items list, and then put a blanket ban on any export of the drug on April 4. The latest decision, which was taken at a high-level meeting on April 6, effectively overturns the previous notification.

The MEA indicated that pre-existing orders, mainly to the U.S., Brazil and European countries would be fulfilled, depending on the stock position and domestic demand for the drug, which would be “continuously monitored”. According to officials, more than two dozen countries have requested supplies of HCQ at the “highest level” in the past few days, but the U.S. and Brazil had stressed that they had made advance payments on their orders

The MEA announcement came hours after U.S. President Donald Trump said that India could invite “retaliation” if it withheld supplies of HCQ for which the U.S., Brazil and other countries have already placed advance orders.

While the drug’s efficacy is not yet clinically proven, Mr. Trump has been a proponent of its use, calling it a “gamechanger”. The Indian Council for Medical Research has also cleared HCQ to be used as a prophylaxis, or preventive medication, by doctors, nurses and other health staff.

The MEA also denied criticism that its decision to reverse the ban had been taken under pressure from the U.S. and other countries.

“Like any responsible government, our first obligation is to ensure that there are adequate stocks of medicines for the requirement of our own people. In order to ensure this, some temporary steps were taken to restrict exports of a number of pharmaceutical products,” its spokesperson said.

 

• The Directorate-General of Foreign Trade (DGFT)had prohibited the export of the drug on 25^th March, 2020. But it left the option of export open to fulfil “export obligation” and on “humanitarian grounds”.

The Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT) organisation is an attached office of the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. This Directorate, with headquarters at New Delhi, is responsible for formulating and implementing the Foreign Trade Policy with the main objective of promoting India’s exports.

 

 

Mehbooba Leaves Jail, Detained At Home Now :

Information in News

Former Jammu & Kashmir Chief Minister and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti was on Tuesday shifted from a Srinagar sub-jail to her official residence, now declared a sub-jail to put her under house detention.

“In exercise of the powers conferred by Clause (b) of Section 2 of the Prisoners Act, 1990, the government hereby declares Fairview, Gupkar Road, Srinagar as “Subsidiary Jail”,” an order issued by Principal Secretary to Government Shaleen Kabra, reads.

The Fairview house on Srinagar’s Gupkar Road is the official residence of Ms. Mufti, who was arrested on August 5 in a crackdown ahead of the revocation of J&K’s special status. She was later booked under the Public Safety Act (PSA) and stayed in solitary confinement for over eight months.

Background Information

Public Safety Act is a defensive detention law that allows taking a person into custody to prevent the maintenance of the law and order.

Former J&K Chief Ministers Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti were booked under the Public Safety Act (PSA) on February 6, 2020. The Jammu and Kashmir administration invoked the PSA to extend the detentions of the two senior politicians along with two other politicians- NC’s Ali Muhammad Sagar and PPP’s Sartaj Madani.

The four politicians had been kept under house arrest since revoking of Article 370 in J&K on August 5, 2019. Their six months of preventive detention ended on February 5, 2020 and immediately after their release, they were booked under the Public Safety Act.

Omar Abdullah’s father and another former J&K Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah was booked under the Public Safety Act (PSA) on September 16, 2019. He had also been kept under house arrest since the revocation of Article 370 of the Indian Constitution.

What is Public Safety Act of Jammu & Kashmir?

• The Public Safety Act, 1978 of Jammu and Kashmir is a defensive detention law that allows taking a person into custody to prevent him or her from acting in any matter that is prejudicial to “the security of the state or the maintenance of the public order”.

Under the act, a person can be held for 2 years without trial and they need not be produced before a court.

• A similar act called the National Security Act (NSA) is used by the other state governments for preventive detention.
• According to the definition, preventive detention is meant to be protective, not punitive. When government authorities slap the PSA on an individual they give this broad definition as the most common ground for detention.
• Any person can be booked under PSA when an administrative order passed either by Divisional

Commissioner (DC) or the District Magistrate (DM). Any detention under this act can’t be made under the order by police based on specific allegations or for a specific violation of laws.

What happens after detention under PSA?

The District Magistrate (DM) communicates to the person within five days and informs him about the reason for the detention in writing. However, DM has a right to communicate within 10 days in exceptional cases. It is important because on the basis on that communication a detained person can make a representation against the order. However, District Magistrate has powers to not to disclose all the facts on the basis of the detention is ordered.

Constitutional safeguards to a detained person
• According to Article 22 (a) of the constitution, no person who is arrested will be detained in the custody without being informed. He will be communicated until he shall be denied the right to consult and to be defended by a legal practitioner of his choice.
• A person detained under the PSA shall be produced before the nearest magistrate within a period of 24 hours (article 22-b).
• However, Article 22(3) (b) allows for preventive detention and restriction on personal liberty for reasons of state security and public order.

 

 Delhi’s ‘5T’ War Against Virus :

Information in News

Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday announced a “5T plan” created by his government to contain COVID-19 spread in Delhi. These five Ts are testing, tracing, treatment, teamwork and tracking-monitoring.

• The first T is testing, which when done on a mass scale enables the actual data of people affected by novel coronavirus and will also be able to identify COVID-19 hotspots and take necessary action. “Like South Korea, we will be testing on a large scale. We have ordered testing for around 50,000 people and rapid testing rounds for 1 lakh people which will begin from Friday,”
• The second T is tracing, which involves identifying and quarantining people who have come in contact with infected persons. “We are taking the help of police to trace whether the people who have been advised to self-quarantine are actually doing it or not. For this, we have given 27,702 contact numbers to the police through which they are tracing their movement,” he said.
• The third component, he said, is treatment. The LNJP and GB Pant hospitals had been declared primary hospitals for COVID-19 treatment with 1,500 and 500 beds respectively, and no other treatments are being carried out there. While the Rajiv Gandhi hospital has 450 beds, 2,450 bedsare available in government hospitals and 450 beds at private ones.

“Serious patients who are suffering from heart diseases and patients above 50 years will be isolated in hospitals and the rest with minor symptoms will be kept in isolation in hotels and dharamshalas,” he said.

• The fourth element of the five-point plan is teamwork and collective efforts are being made to fight the virus. All State governments, he said, must learn from each other and work together.
• The fifth T, is tracking and monitoring. “It is my responsibility to ensure that all these measures are in place and all the systems are functioning smoothly. I am tracking and monitoring all these things 24×7,” he said.

 

 

Odisha Telemedicine Helpline Starts Working From Today :

Information in News

Over 300 doctors have registered with Helpline 14410

The Odisha government will make a special telemedicine helpline operational from Wednesday to provide free services to citizens showing possible COVID-19 symptoms.

The helpline(14410) being set up in association with a Delhi-based firm will provide platform for people seeking advice from their homes.

In case someone is unable to get through the special telemedicine helpline, he will be directed to the 104 helpline, which is receiving 12,000 to 14,000 calls per day.

 

 

Three Manipal Students Win MIT’s COVID­19 Hackathon :

Information in News

• A team of three students from Manipal Institute of Technology which linked up with three professionals has won the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) COVID-19 Challenge event.
• The team was declared as winner of its track – ‘Who to test and when’ under ‘How to protect vulnerable populations from the effects of COVID-19?’ There were a total of 10 tracks.
• They narrowed down to the problem of overcrowded hospitals with inappropriate admissions, whereas less than 5% of the average population under 50 years of age requires hospitalisation.
• Their solution was to build a TeleHealth platform for non-contact monitoring of vital signs such as heart rate, respiratory rate and blood oxygen concentration using just a phone camera, or webcam at home. “This cross-platform application avoids reliance on contact-based pulse oximeters,”
• “This can be further developed into a telemedicine platform, wherein doctors and hospital administrations can remotely identify the progress of the patients. This is useful in prevention of transfer of COVID-19 to healthcare professionals,”

 

Pulse oximeter 

• A pulse oximeteris a medical device that indirectly monitors the oxygen saturation of a patient’s blood (as opposed to measuring oxygen saturation directly through a blood sample) and changes in blood volume in the skin, producing a photoplethysmogram that may be further processed into other measurements.
• Pulse oximetryis a noninvasive and painless test that measures your oxygen saturation level, or the oxygen levels in your blood. It can rapidly detect even small changes in how efficiently oxygen is being carried to the extremities furthest from the heart, including the legs and the arms
• A photoplethysmogram(PPG) is an optically obtained plethysmogram that can be used to detect blood volume changes in the microvascular bed of tissue. A PPG is often obtained by using a pulse oximeter which illuminates the skin and measures changes in light absorption.
• Normal pulse oximeter readingsusually range from 95 to 100 percent. Values under 90 percent are considered low, and indicate the need for supplemental oxygen.

 

Sonia Offers Suggestions To Govt. In Pandemic fight :

Information in News

In the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak, Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Tuesday wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, offering five suggestions to cut government expenditure, including scrapping the ₹20,000-crore for the Central Vista project, bannning government advertisements to media, and putting on hold all official foreign trips.

• “First, impose a complete ban on media advertisements – television, print and online – by the Government and Public Sectors Undertakings [PSUs] for a period of two years. The only exceptions should be advisories for Covid-19 or for issues relating to public health,” the Centre spent ₹1,250 crore annually on media advertisements.
• “Secondly, suspend the ₹20,000 crore ‘Central Vista’ beautification and construction project forthwith. At a time like this, such an outlay seems self-indulgent to say the least. I am certain that Parliament can function comfortably within the existing historical buildings,”she stated. The money could be spent on “constructing new hospital infrastructure and diagnostics along with equipping our front line workers with Personal Protection Equipment [PPE] and better facilities.”
• There should be a proportionate 30 per cent reduction in the expenditure budget (other than salaries, pensions and central sector schemes) for the Union government. “This 30 per cent (i.e. ₹2.5 lakh crore a year approximately) could then be allocated towards establishing an economic safety net for migrant workers, labourers, farmers, MSMEs and those in the unorganised sector.”
• The Centre had spent ₹393 crore on foreign travel in the past five years. “All foreign visits, including that of the President, the Prime Minister, Union Ministers, Chief Ministers, State Ministers and bureaucrats must be put on hold in a similar fashion”. Exceptions could be made in case of special emergency or exigencies in national interest to be cleared by the Prime Minister.
• All money under the PM-CARES Fund moved to the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund (PMNRF) to ensure “efficiency, transparency, accountability and audit in the manner in which these funds are allocated and spent”.

₹3800 crore approximately are lying unutilised in the PMNRF [at the end of FY2019]. These funds, plus the amount in PM-CARES Fund, can be utilised to ensure an immediate food security net for those at the very margins of society,”

 

Amid Lockdown In Russia, Gaganyaan Trainees Healthy  : 

Information in News

Glavkosmos says training has been neither stopped nor suspended and is going on as scheduled

Countries and organisations around the world have halted routines and chosen isolation as the way to check the COVID-19 pandemic. Evidently the four Indian astronaut candidates training in Moscow are no exception to a lockdown in their own spaces — for at least this month.

While space missions have been quietly suspended and deferred in India and everywhere else.

Glavkosmos stressed that the training has been neither stopped nor suspended and is going on as scheduled. They are healthy and have been working and exercising on their own for the last week or so at the GCTC.

The four candidates are pilots in the Indian Air Force. They started their year-long general training programme in early February. The finalist/s will circle Earth for a few days as part of the first Indian human space mission, Gaganyaan, which is planned for the year 2022.

The candidates are healthy and have completed 25% of the programme and continue working according to their training plan, Mr. Loskutov said.

Last week they passed the exam to gauge how much they knew the onboard systems of the manned spacecraft.

ISRO’s Human Spaceflight Centre and Glavkosmos signed the training agreement in June 2019.

The training includes comprehensive and biomedical training; physical practices; detailed study of the systems of the Soyuz module; manned spaceship, weightlessness training on the special Ilyushin-76MDK aircraft.

They will be taught skills required during any abnormal landing of the spaceship besides a part that is specific to handling Gaganyaan spacecraft.

 

Special UN Session Likely Tomorrow : 

Information in News

India is gearing for diplomatic activities as the U.N. Security Council appears set for a special session over the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sources here indicated that South Block is tracking reports that a special closed session of the UNSC is to be held as early as on April 9 when all 15 members of the highest U.N. body are likely to discuss the situation on the intensifying crisis that has disrupted life and economy in India as well.

The session will draw statements from all the member-countries with interested non-members participating as observers. A meeting of the UNSC had been talked about since the beginning of the pandemic in China in December 2019, but the process seems to have taken off with the arrival of the Dominican Republic as the president of the body. Veteran diplomat of the country Jose Singer said on taking charge the UNSC is ‘engaged’ regarding the pandemic. The meeting though closed is not “closed door” and there is a possibility that it could be globally webcast if all members agree.

Though other regional and global bodies like G20 have convened urgent virtual summits, the Security Council’s inability to meet raised concern in world capitals in recent weeks.

 

 

Loss Of Smell May Be Linked To Cells: Study :

Information in News

Virus may be inflicting an indirect attack on the olfactory sensory cells, says study

Can a loss of smell be an early warning for a COVID-19 infection? Multiple reports have surfaced, primarily from Europe and the United States, from physicians and ear, nose and throat specialists, of COVID-19 patients complaining of an inability to smell — or anosmia. However, it is not clear whether neurons in the brain that are responsible for recognising various odours are damaged, or whether other cells may be involved.

Not directly

• Study that is still being peer-reviewed but available as a public preprint, that it is not neurons but a class of cells in the upper regions of the nasal cavity that may be involved: these are called sustentacular cells and horizontal basal cells. Crucially, both are not directly involved in helping us smell, but nourish and support the cells that help us do, and so the virus may be inflicting an indirect attack on the olfactory sensory cells.

While research on this aspect of the disease is emerging, studies say the loss of smell is different from diminished smell or a lack of perceiving flavour in food when one is afflicted with a cold or stuffy nose.

• By bio-informatics tools and estimating the presence of a key enzyme — called ACE 2 (Angiotensin Converting Enzyme) — in these olfactory cells. The coronavirus has spike proteins that bind to ACE 2 receptors on human cells and the enzyme’s presence is a proxy to revealing the signature of the virus in the body’s cells.

Clinical symptoms

• Research so far suggests that it take between 5-14 days for clinical symptoms of the virus — dry cough, laboured breathing and fever — to show and unless this manifested, those infected are likely to continue socialising and spreading the virus.
• “Because the loss of smell surfaces much earlier, anyone who does not feel sick but registers a significant inability to smell could self-isolate and cease infecting others. A questionnaire could be used via an app, for users to check or report these systems to a doctor,” he told
• An analysis by a team at King’s College London showed that 59% of COVID-19 positive patients reported a loss of smell and taste, compared with only 18% of those who tested negative for the disease. These results were much stronger in predicting a positive COVID-19 diagnosis than self-reported fever, he added.

Potential application

“Multiple clinicians have highlighted the abrupt loss of smell in a large number of SARS-CoV-2 [coronavirus] infected individuals, particularly from Britain, the U.S., France, South Korea, China, Germany and Iran, therefore, collectively reinforce its potential application as the first line of diagnostics in the patients possessing SARS-CoV-2 hallmark symptoms,” the report adds.

 

 

 

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