With the Covid-19 situation worsening around the world by the day, the global death toll from the virus surpassed 3.7 million on Saturday.
According to Johns Hopkins University (JHU), the total case count and fatalities currently stand at 172,449,514 and 3,708,280, respectively.
Besides, a total of 2,043,089,118 vaccine doses have been administered across the world to date, as per the university data.
The US, which remains the world’s worst-hit hit country in terms of deaths and cases, has so far logged 33,343,073 cases and 597,001 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins.
Brazil on Friday registered 1,454 new deaths from Covid-19 in 24 hours, raising the total tally to 470,842, the health ministry said.
A total of 37,936 new infections were detected during the period, pushing up the country’s total caseload to 16,841,408, the ministry said.
Brazil has the world’s second-highest Covid-19 death toll, after the United States, and the third-largest caseload after the United States and India.
The pandemic continues to ravage India. The neighbouring country registered 132,364 new Covid cases on Friday, the federal health ministry said.
India’s Covid tally currently stands at 28,574,350, according to the ministry.
Besides, 2,713 deaths have been reported since Wednesday morning, raising the nationwide death toll to 340,702.
Situation in Bangladesh
Bangladesh on Friday logged 1,887 new cases in 24 hours, after health authorities tested 18,151 samples. The fresh cases has raised the country’s total case count to 807,867.
Also, the daily infection rate rose to 10.40% from Thursday’s 9.94%, while the mortality rate remained static at 1.58%, according to the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).
Meanwhile, the country confirmed 34 more deaths during the same period, pushing up the fatality figures to 12,758.
Lockdown in districts
Due to the recent rise in Covid infections in frontier districts, authorities have imposed lockdown in Rajshahi, Khulna, Satkhira and parts of Naogaon districts to curb the transmission of the virus.
The district administrations have been given the authority to enforce lockdown in
areas under their jurisdiction if the Covid-19 situation worsens.
Vaccination drive
Bangladesh launched its vaccination drive on February 7 with Oxford-AstraZeneca doses bought from India’s Serum Institute.
So far, four vaccines – Oxford-AstraZeneca (Covishield), Sputnik-V, Sinopharm, and Pfizer-BioNTech – have got emergency use authorisation in the country.
However, the country, the prime recipient of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, has suspended the registration for Covid-19 jabs due to vaccine shortage amid a delay in the arrival of shipments from India.
IEDCR study
Delta, the coronavirus variant first found in India, turned out to be 80% of some 50 genomes sequenced in Bangladesh since May 16 by IEDCR. There is also evidence of community transmission of the variant, according to research jointly carried out by IEDCR and IDSHI.
The study also identified one “unknown variant” and found eight of the samples (16%) to be infected with the South African variant.
IEDCR and IDSHI collected and analysed 50 samples from across the country, including border districts and the capital since May 16.
The research also found 40 out of the total 50 cases as Delta variant, known as Indian variant, in samples collected from Chapainawabganj, Gopalganj, Khulna, Dhaka, Dinajpur, Gaibandha, Bagerhat, Jhenaidah and Pirojpur.
