5G technology not causing spread of COVID, says govt

India is witnessing a declining trend in the active number of COVID cases. The Health and Family Welfare Ministry on Monday said that the active cases comprise 16.52 per cent of the cumulative positive cases. There are over 37,45,000 active cases in the country at present. As a positive sign, the COVID-19 recovery rate of the country is also consistently improving. As the country is registering more than three lakh recoveries daily from the past many days, the recovery rate has further improved to 82.38 per cent. The Health Ministry has said over 3,53,000 patients have recovered from this infectious disease within 24 hours. The country has registered over 3,66,000 new COVID cases till Monday morning. -Government has scotched the rumors that 5G technology is causing the spread of COVID-19. The Ministry of Communications said it has come to its notice that several misleading messages are being circulated on various social media platforms claiming that the second wave of coronavirus has been caused by the testing of the 5G mobile towers. It said, these messages are utter nonsense and absolutely incorrect. It urged the general public not to be fooled by fake information and rumours spread in this matter. The Ministry said, the claims linking the 5G technology with the COVID-19 pandemic has no scientific basis. It informed that testing of the 5G network has not yet started anywhere in India and the claim that 5G Trials or networks are causing coronavirus in India is baseless and untrue. Mobile towers emit non-ionizing low Radio frequencies and are incapable of causing any kind of damage to living cells including human beings. The Department of Telecommunications has prescribed norms for exposure limits for the Radio Frequency Field which are ten times more stringent than the safe limits prescribed by International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection, ICNIRP and recommended by WHO. -Shahi Imam of Delhi's Jama Masjid, Syed Ahmed Bukhari has appealed to people to offer Eid-ul-Fitr prayers at their homes in view of the Coronavirus pandemic. The Shahi Imam of Fatehpuri Mosque, Mufti Mukarram Ahmed has also made a similar appeal and both have urged the people to follow utmost precaution to protect themselves as well as others in this pandemic situation. Eid-ul-Fitr is likely to be celebrated on 14 May, depending on the sighting of the Moon. -Days after the Supreme Court praised the Mumbai Model of COVID-19 management, the BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has shared its experience of Oxygen management and not letting people die gasping for breath. Earlier, Niti Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant had also congratulated Mumbai Commissioner Iqbal Singh Chahal and his team for an inspirational Mumbai Model of COVID management that included centralized bed allotment, anticipating oxygen storage facilities, dashboards for monitoring and war rooms for patient follow up. -Major opposition parties of the Nepali parliament have started preparations to form a new government after Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli lost the vote of confidence at Lower Houseon Monday. Opposition leaders, Sher Bahadur Deuba, Pushpa Kamal Dahal and Upendra Yadav had called on President Bidya Devi Bhandari to initiate government formation procedure, soon after the commencement of a special session of parliament on Monday. All leaders from the Nepali Congress, the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist Centre) and a faction of the Janata Samajwadi party led by Yadav have urged President Bhandari to invoke Article 76 (2) of the Constitution.Earlier, Nepal Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli lost the vote of confidence in the House of Representatives. He secured only 93 votes in the lower house of parliament during a special session convened on the directives of President Bidya Devi Bhandari. -The government has said that over one Lakh Metric Tonnes of food grains distributed to over two crore beneficiaries by 12 States and Union Territories so far under Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana- PMGKAY-3. Secretary, Department of Food and Public Distribution Shudhanshu Pandey briefed the media about PMGKAY-3 and One Nation One Ration Card, ONORC scheme through a virtual press conference. He said, the department started implementatPandey informed that the distribution of food grains is going as per schedule for the month of May and so far 15.55 Lakh Metric Tonnes of food grains have been lifted from Food Corporation of India depots by 34 States and UTs for this month. He said that almost all States have indicated an action plan to complete the distribution of PMGKAY-3 Foodgrains, for the months of May and June by the end of next montion of the scheme for two months, May and June 2021 by providing an additional quota of free-of-cost foodgrains at a scale of 5 kilograms per person per month.