1. India on Sunday registered 4,03,738 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, taking the tally of infections in the country to 2,22,96,414 since the pandemic broke out last year. The country’s toll climbed by 4,092 deaths to 2,42,362. India now has over 37 lakh active cases and 1,83,17,404 recoveries.
  2. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal announced that his administration had decided to extend the lockdown in the Capital till May 17. The chief minister also announced that the Delhi Metro will stop operations from Monday. Uttar Pradesh also extended the partial curbs in the state till 7 am on May 17 amid a surge in daily infections. Jammu and Kashmir too extended lockdown in all 20 districts till May 17.
  3. The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said that the primary reason through which many are getting infected with the SARS-CoV-2 virus was very fine aerosolised particles transmitted during respiration. It added that the “risk of transmission is greatest within three to six feet of an infectious source”, where the most concentration of the very fine particles occurs.
  4. Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the 5% tax imposed on Covid-19 vaccines and 12% on medicines and oxygen concentrators will not be waived off as it was required to maintain costs.
  5. Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia criticised the Centre for exporting Covid-19 vaccines, saying that a large number of lives could have been saved if the shots had been given to people in the country first.
  6. The Delhi government on Saturday received only 499 metric tonnes, or 71%, of the total quantity of daily medical oxygen that the Supreme Court had mandated, according to a government bulletin on oxygen. The minister explained the rationale behind the taxes hours after West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, urging him to waive all forms of taxations and customs duty on medical equipment and drugs used to treat Covid-19.
  7. The Shiv Sena said that India’s management of the coronavirus pandemic was dependent on the system created in the last 70 years by previous prime ministers. The remark, made in an editorial of the party’s mouthpiece Saamana, was a jibe at the Narendra Modi-government, which has often held past dispensations responsible for the current problems plaguing the country.
  8. World Health Organisation Chief Scientist Soumya Swaminathan said the coronavirus variant spreading in India was more contagious and might be evading the protection offered by vaccines. In an interview to the news agency, the scientist said that these factor were contributing to the massive outbreak of the infection in the second wave.  
  9. The Indian Medical Association said the Union health ministry was showing “extreme lethargy” and taking “inappropriate actions” in dealing with the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic.
  10. Globally, the coronavirus has now infected 15.72 crore people and killed over 32.78 lakh since the pandemic broke out in December 2019, according to Johns Hopkins University. Over 9.33 crore people have recovered from the infection.