India considers booster shot for all over 18s

According to sources familiar with the matter, on March 21, the Government of India is discussing expanding the number of subjects eligible for free booster shots. India has just launched the third dose of COVID-19 vaccine for frontline workers and people over 60 years old, free of charge at state vaccination facilities and for a fee at private hospitals.

The number of new COVID-19 cases in India has dropped to the lowest level in more than a year, with 1,549 cases in the past 24 hours. Along with 31 new deaths recorded, India now has 516,510 deaths out of more than 43 million cases. However, the Indian Ministry of Health called on states to strengthen contact tracing measures due to concerns that the number of new cases increased again in some parts of Asia and Europe, including China and Italy.

To date, India has injected 1.81 billion doses of the COVID-19 vaccine, of which more than 20 million are booster shots.

* In Israel, after a month of continuous decline, the infection rate and the number of new cases of COVID-19 in the country are increasing again, raising concerns that the epidemic wave is at risk of resurgence.

According to the Vietnam News Agency correspondent in Tel Aviv, the announcement of the Israeli Ministry of Health said that the number of new COVID-19 cases recorded on March 21 was 12,869 cases, an increase of 5,070 cases compared to the previous day, bringing the total number of cases to 49,349 cases. At the same time, the R coefficient also increased to 1.23. A level above 1.0 indicates that the disease is spreading. However, the number of severe COVID-19 cases is still at a low level of 328, a slight increase compared to March 20.

To date, over 6.7 million people in Israel have received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, accounting for about 72% of the population; while the number of people getting the second dose is 6.12 million people.