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The Union Cabinet chaired by Hon’ble Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi today has approved a new scheme ‘India COVID-19 Emergency Response & Health System Preparedness Package: Phase-II’ amounting to Rs. 23,123 crore for FY 2021-22. This scheme aims to accelerate health system preparedness for immediate responsiveness for early prevention, detection and management, with the focus on health infrastructure development including for Paediatric Care and with measurable outcomes.

The Phase-II of the Package has Central Sector (CS) and Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSS) components.

Under the Central Sector components,

• Support would be provided to Central Hospitals, AIIMS, and other Institutions of National Importance under DoHFW (at VMMC & Safdarjung Hospital, Delhi, LHMC & SSKH, Delhi, RML, Delhi, RIMS, Imphal and NEIGRIMS, Shillong, PGIMER, Chandigarh, JIPMER, Puducherry and AIIMS Delhi (existing AIIMSs) and new AIIMSs under PMSSY) for repurposing 6,688 beds for COVID management. 
• National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) would be strengthened by providing Genome Sequencing machines, besides sanctioning Scientific Control room, Epidemic Intelligence Services (EIS) and INSACOG Secretariat support.  
• Support would be provided for implementation of Hospital Management Information System (HMIS) in all the District Hospitals of the Country (presently, it is implemented only in 310 DHs). All district –hospitals would implement HMIS through NIC developed E-Hospital and CDAC developed E-Shushrutsoftwares. This will be the biggest impetus for implementation of the National Digital Health Mission (NDHM) at the DHs. This support includes the support provided to the District Hospitals towards augmentation of the hardware capacity.
• Support would also be provided for expanding the National Architecture of eSanjeevani Tele-consultation platform to provide upto 5 lakhs tele-consultations per day from the present 50,000 Tele-consultations per day. This includes support to the States/UTs to enable tele-consultations with the COVID patients at the COVID Care Centres (CCCs) by strengthening Hubs for eSanjeevani Tele-consultation in all the districts of the country.
• Support would also be provided for IT interventions, including strengthening the Central War room at DoHFW, strengthening Country’s COVID-19 Portal, 1075 COVID help lines and COWIN platform.   

Under the CSS components, the efforts are aimed at strengthening district and sub district capacity for an effective and rapid response to the pandemic.  States/UTs would be supported to:

• Create Paediatric units in all 736 districts and also, to establish Paediatric Centre of Excellence (PaediatricCoE) in each State/UT, (either in Medical Colleges, State Govt. Hospitals or Central Hospitals such as AIIMS, INIs, etc) for providing Tele-ICU services, mentoring and technical hand-holding to the District Paediatric units.
• Augment 20,000 ICU beds in public healthcare system out of which 20% will be Pediatric ICU beds.
• Provide care closer to the community due to the ingress of COVID-19 in rural, peri-urban and tribal areas, by creating pre-fabricated structures for adding additional beds at the existing CHCs, PHCs and SHCs (6-20 bedded units) and support would also be provided to establish bigger field hospitals (50-100 bedded units) depending on the needs at tier-II or Tier-III cities and district HQs.
• Install 1050 numbers of Liquid Medical Oxygen Storage Tanks with Medical Gas Pipeline System (MGPS), with an aim to support at least one such unit per district.
• Augment the existing feet of ambulances – 8,800 ambulances will be added under the package.
• Engage Undergraduate and post graduate medical interns and final year MMBS, BSc, & GNM nursing students for effective COVID management.
• As “Test, Isolate and Treat” and following-up COVID Appropriate Behaviour at all the times, is the national strategy for effective COVID-19, support is provided to the States to maintain at least 21.5 lakhs per day.
• Flexible support to the Districts for meeting the requirement of essential medicines for COVID-19 management, including creation of buffer stock.    

“India COVID-19 Emergency Response and Health Systems Preparedness Project: Phase-II” would be implemented at a total cost of ₹ 23,123 Crore, from 01″ July 2021 to 31″ March 2022 with central and state share as under:

• Central Share of the ECRP-II –Rs.15,000 crore
• State Share of the ECRP-II –Rs.8,123 crore

 With the focus on immediate needs for the next nine months of FY 21-22, to provide support to Central government hospitals / agencies and to State/UT Governments to augment their existing response to the second wave and the evolving pandemic, including at district and sub district levels in peripheral facilities.

Background:

In March 2020 last year, when the country was faced with the first wave of the COVID 19 pandemic, the PM announced a Central Sector Scheme of Rs. 15,000 crorefor the “India COVID 19 Emergency Response and Health Systems Preparedness Package”, providing a critical impetus to the efforts of MoHFW and States/UTs, and catalysing health systems activities for pandemic management.  Since mid-February 2021, the country is experiencing a second wave with spread into rural, peri-urban and tribal areas.  

 Today Latest positive and death report Covid-19

*POSITIVE-839, DEATH-12*

 Today Latest positive and death report Covid-19

*POSITIVE-839, DEATH-12*

A Virtual meeting between Shri Narendra Singh Tomar, Union Minister for Agriculture & Farmers Welfare and Mr. Janusz Wojciechowski, Member of the European Commission, Agriculture was held on 7th July, 2021. The strong momentum of the India-EU relations especially since the last India-EU Summit in July, 2020 was acknowledged. Both dignitaries expressed their condolences for the loss of lives due to COVID-19 pandemic. Union Agriculture Minister thanked the EU & its Member States for coming forward in support of India in these critical times. 

Both dignitaries  discussed  EU Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) and the recent India market reforms; EU Farm to Fork Strategy and UN Food System Summit and  bilateral cooperation; G20 Agriculture Minister process and fixation of the Maximum Residue Limit of Tricyclazole in Indian Basmati Rice by the EU. The Member of the European Commission, Agriculture explained in detail the recent reforms undertaken by the EU in the Common Agriculture Policy as well as the EU Farm to Fork Strategy to make agriculture green as well as sustainable. He also mentioned that the EU has set a target of bringing 25 per cent of area in the EU under Organic Farming by 2030. 

The Union Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare explained the scenario of agriculture in India and the dominance of small farmers and the commitment of the Government of India towards welfare of farmers in India. The Agriculture Minister  highlighted the recent initiatives taken by the Government of India to increase the incomes of the farmers, the launch of Agriculture Infrastructure Fund with a corpus of Rs One Lakh Crore for development of farm gate and agriculture marketing infrastructure in rural areas, scheme of formation of 10000 FPOs to help small and marginal farmers in marketing of agricultural produce. He enlisted the steps being taken by the Government of India to make agriculture sustainable and environment friendly which included encouragement of application nano-urea and Organic Farming under the Pramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana. He also highlighted the initiative of encouraging organic farming on either sides of Ganga river up to 5 Km through formation of clusters wherein 11 lakh farmers have already enrolled. 

The Agriculture Minister acknowledged India’s support to the UN Food Systems Summit and informed the EU delegation that he will be leading the India delegation to the Pre-Summit being organized from 26th to 28th July, 2021 virtually.

 Shri Tomar also raised the issue of fixing the Maximum Residual Limit (MRL) of Tricyclazole used in rice crop which has been a concern for India and is affecting India’s Basmati Rice Exports to the EU. All the required studies and documents have been submitted to EU in May-2021 and MRL will be fixed by second quarter of 2022 before next season.

Shri Tomar suggested that until then the issue may be resolved through other mitigation measures. Member of the European Commission, said that such  issues are not under his mandate, however, he assured of the Indian side to raise the issues with his concerned colleagues in European commission. 

Both the dignitaries thanked each other for providing useful  information on India-EU cooperation as well as  Agriculture reforms in respective regions and also promised to work for the welfare of  small & marginal farmers. 

A Virtual meeting between Shri Narendra Singh Tomar, Union Minister for Agriculture & Farmers Welfare and Mr. Janusz Wojciechowski, Member of the European Commission, Agriculture was held on 7th July, 2021. The strong momentum of the India-EU relations especially since the last India-EU Summit in July, 2020 was acknowledged. Both dignitaries expressed their condolences for the loss of lives due to COVID-19 pandemic. Union Agriculture Minister thanked the EU & its Member States for coming forward in support of India in these critical times. 

Both dignitaries  discussed  EU Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) and the recent India market reforms; EU Farm to Fork Strategy and UN Food System Summit and  bilateral cooperation; G20 Agriculture Minister process and fixation of the Maximum Residue Limit of Tricyclazole in Indian Basmati Rice by the EU. The Member of the European Commission, Agriculture explained in detail the recent reforms undertaken by the EU in the Common Agriculture Policy as well as the EU Farm to Fork Strategy to make agriculture green as well as sustainable. He also mentioned that the EU has set a target of bringing 25 per cent of area in the EU under Organic Farming by 2030. 

The Union Minister of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare explained the scenario of agriculture in India and the dominance of small farmers and the commitment of the Government of India towards welfare of farmers in India. The Agriculture Minister  highlighted the recent initiatives taken by the Government of India to increase the incomes of the farmers, the launch of Agriculture Infrastructure Fund with a corpus of Rs One Lakh Crore for development of farm gate and agriculture marketing infrastructure in rural areas, scheme of formation of 10000 FPOs to help small and marginal farmers in marketing of agricultural produce. He enlisted the steps being taken by the Government of India to make agriculture sustainable and environment friendly which included encouragement of application nano-urea and Organic Farming under the Pramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana. He also highlighted the initiative of encouraging organic farming on either sides of Ganga river up to 5 Km through formation of clusters wherein 11 lakh farmers have already enrolled. 

The Agriculture Minister acknowledged India’s support to the UN Food Systems Summit and informed the EU delegation that he will be leading the India delegation to the Pre-Summit being organized from 26th to 28th July, 2021 virtually.

 Shri Tomar also raised the issue of fixing the Maximum Residual Limit (MRL) of Tricyclazole used in rice crop which has been a concern for India and is affecting India’s Basmati Rice Exports to the EU. All the required studies and documents have been submitted to EU in May-2021 and MRL will be fixed by second quarter of 2022 before next season.

Shri Tomar suggested that until then the issue may be resolved through other mitigation measures. Member of the European Commission, said that such  issues are not under his mandate, however, he assured of the Indian side to raise the issues with his concerned colleagues in European commission. 

Both the dignitaries thanked each other for providing useful  information on India-EU cooperation as well as  Agriculture reforms in respective regions and also promised to work for the welfare of  small & marginal farmers. 

The Union Home Secretary chaired a meeting here today to review the COVID-19 situation in all the North Eastern (NE) States and Union Territories (UTs).

During the meeting, current status and trends on the active cases, Case Fatality Rate (CFR), Case Positivity Rate (CPR) and vaccination status in respect of all the UTs and NE States was discussed. It was also noted that out of 73 districts in the country with CPR above 10 percent, 46 districts are in NE States, where strict containment measures need to be taken as per extant guidelines.

          The Union Home Secretary emphasised to follow five-fold strategy of Test-Track-Treat-Vaccinate and COVID appropriate behaviour, as has been laid out in Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) order dated 29th June, 2021. The NE States and UTs were advised to strictly monitor the situation at district/ city level and take timely corrective measures, wherever any early sign of surge is noticed.  For those districts identified with high case positivity and higher bed occupancy, States/UTs may consider imposing restrictions in a calibrated manner. Strict enforcement of COVID appropriate behaviour was reiterated and it was advised to involve political leaders and civil society organisations.

The meeting was attended by Chief Secretaries, Directors General of Police and Principal Secretaries (Health) of these States/UTs. Member (Health) NitiAayog, Director NCDC and senior officers of the MHA and the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare were also present.

The Union Home Secretary chaired a meeting here today to review the COVID-19 situation in all the North Eastern (NE) States and Union Territories (UTs).

During the meeting, current status and trends on the active cases, Case Fatality Rate (CFR), Case Positivity Rate (CPR) and vaccination status in respect of all the UTs and NE States was discussed. It was also noted that out of 73 districts in the country with CPR above 10 percent, 46 districts are in NE States, where strict containment measures need to be taken as per extant guidelines.

          The Union Home Secretary emphasised to follow five-fold strategy of Test-Track-Treat-Vaccinate and COVID appropriate behaviour, as has been laid out in Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) order dated 29th June, 2021. The NE States and UTs were advised to strictly monitor the situation at district/ city level and take timely corrective measures, wherever any early sign of surge is noticed.  For those districts identified with high case positivity and higher bed occupancy, States/UTs may consider imposing restrictions in a calibrated manner. Strict enforcement of COVID appropriate behaviour was reiterated and it was advised to involve political leaders and civil society organisations.

The meeting was attended by Chief Secretaries, Directors General of Police and Principal Secretaries (Health) of these States/UTs. Member (Health) NitiAayog, Director NCDC and senior officers of the MHA and the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare were also present.

Union Minister of State (I/C) for Ports, Shipping & Waterways Shri Mansukh Mandaviya virtually inaugurated Medical Oxygen Generator Unit with copper piping network at State Government hospital, Rambaug in Kutch today. Deendayal Port has installed the facility at the total cost of approx. Rs. 50 lakh, to cater the treatment of patients at the hospital.

Speaking on the occasion, Shri Mandaviya congratulated the port team and all stakeholders for installing the second oxygen plan within a month. He said that the plant will ensure expeditious oxygen refilling for smooth and continuous oxygen supply to all the beds & wards in the hospital. Shri Mandaviya said all ports are contributing to fighting against COVID-19 through their CSR activities. It is the responsibility of ports to provide better facilities to the people living in the surrounding areas, he added.