Our Funarena!

The government of India has extended national lockdown in containment zones till 31 st August, 2020 which was expected considering the continuous surge in new COVID-19 cases for more than a month now; the total India-lockdown days set to go beyond 128 with the new extension. Guidelines for Unlock-3 were also announced in rest of the areas. As per the new guidelines announced last evening night curfew is going to be lifted from 5 th of August everywhere, and gyms/yoga institutes are going to reopen from the same date. The August 15 Independence Day celebrations shall have to be observed with curbs, from the national level to the village panchayat levels. All other relaxations announced in Unlock-1 and Unlock-2, of course, will continue to be valid. What will continue to remain shut are: schools/colleges/educational institutes closed till 31 st August; Metro railway and regular passenger trains not to operate till fresh announcements; international flights that are operating un

Optimism for a possible cure for COVID-19 has been growing since the positive results obtained for the vaccine being developed by Oxford-AstraZeneca in its initial two human trials. Now, two more vaccines, namely by Moderna Inc and by Pfizer Inc in the USA, have entered the final or phase-3 of human clinical trials. Both the vaccines are starting the trials with volunteers up to 30,000 each. The final trials will check the safety and the effectiveness of the vaccines in humans in ages between 18 to 85, and hopefully it could clear the way for regulatory approval and widespread use by the end of this year itself, as per news reports. While Moderna Therapeutics had never brought a vaccine to the market before Pfizer started its vaccine development process in 2019 in collaboration with a German biotech firm BioNTech. The last-stage clinical trials of the duo will be done in 39 states across the US, and also in countries like Argentina, Brazil and Germany; in all, 120 global sites.

Some people always start with a ‘no’ to anything uttered or addressed to; of course, many of them don’t really mean ‘no’, it’s being somewhat a habit of saying so. However, for others a ‘no means no’ always to all matters under the sun, even if the most correct piece of news or development is reported to them for the first time. This is the germ of negativity that, if unchecked, eventually takes full control of the hapless human mind. Such negative vibes are often infectious, affecting all around adversely, let it be homes or offices or public places. This writer has experienced this syndrome in his various train journeys: yes, in India most people are woefully used to late running of the trains, but when a train in fact is doing great, running on time or ever before time, those souls continue to emit the negative vibes ‘no, it’s running late already or going to run late or will finally arrive three-four hours late’ and so on; and this writer has seen on many occasions how these n