-The Hindu Over the last few decades, intellectual property rules have served as a lethal barrier to the right to access healthcare Even an unprecedented pandemic can do little, it appears, to upset the existing global regime governing monopoly rights over the production and distribution of life-saving drugs. If anything, since the onset of COVID-19, we’ve only seen a reaffirmation of intellectual property rules that have served as a lethal barrier to...

-The Hindu Unlike the rest of India, Kerala has maintained the same level of daily testing despite a reduction in number of cases From mid-February, a spike in daily new cases was reported from a few States including Maharashtra. For days on end, the Health Ministry kept repeating the message that Kerala too was “witnessing an upsurge of daily new cases”. Even as recently as March 6, the Health Ministry wrongly implicated...

-The Indian Express Apar Gupta writes: The substance of many of the requirements were never put to public consultation or deliberation by experts. This is particularly the case for the regulations for online news portals and video streaming platforms. In the polarised environment that we now inhabit, there are few public agreements. One of these rare instances is an agreement that social media is broken. For many commentators, this is an area...

-The Hindu Company releases fact sheet detailing possible adverse events and those who are eligible for the vaccine Those with any history of allergies, fever and bleeding disorder, on blood thinners and who are Immunity compromised or on medication have been told by COVAXIN manufacturer Bharat Biotech not to take the vaccine. A statement uploaded on the company website on Monday said the vaccine was also contraindicated for pregnant/lactating women, those using other...

-Down to Earth This weak link between growth in income and nutritional outcomes requires the attention of policy makers The Covid pandemic reminds us that we may have to fight a battle more than once to win it. Low-income countries like India faced a multi-pronged crisis during the pandemic — containing the infections while being home to 195.9 million of the 821 million undernourished people in the world. Prevalence of undernourishment in India...