KATHMANDU: Covishield, the vaccine against COVID-19, would be administered from 17 vaccination centers in Kathmandu Valley.
Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli is scheduled to inaugurate the vaccination amidst a virtual program at 10 am on Wednesday.
Seventeen hospitals in the Valley have been designated as the vaccination centers, Dr. Jhalak Sharma Gautam, Director of the Child Health and Vaccination Section at the Department of Health Services, said.
According to him, there will be 12 vaccination centers in Kathmandu, three vaccination centers in Lalitpur, and two vaccination centers in Bhaktapur.
The vaccination centers in Kathmandu are the Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital, the Bir Hospital, the Shukraraj Tropical, and Communicable Disease Hospital, Nepal Medical College Jorpati, the Paropakar Maternity and Women’s Hospital, the Sahid Dharma Bhakta Organ Transplant Centre, the Armed Police Force (APF) Balambu Hospital and the Sahid Gangalal Hospital etc.
Similarly, the designated vaccination centers in Lalitpur include Patan Academy of Health Sciences, KIST Medical College, and the Anandaban Hospital.
Likewise, the designated vaccination centers in Bhaktapur are the Bhaktapur Hospital and the Korea Friendship Hospital.
Director Gautam said an inspection has been carried out today at the hospitals designated as vaccination centers in the Kathmandu Valley.
In the inauguration program, vaccines would be administered simultaneously at the 62 hospitals and more than 120 vaccination centers in all seven provinces.
The Section has made preparation for administering vaccines through 300 vaccination centers in the 77 districts within January 31.
One million doses of vaccines were brought to Nepal from India on January 21. The Indian government had provided the vaccines under the grant assistance.
Dr Gautam said the vaccines have reached all the provinces. The Ministry of Health and Population will conclude the vaccination campaign within 10 days of the launching of the first phase of vaccination. Four hundred thirty thousand persons would be given the vaccines in the first phase.
The government is making preparation to bring vaccines for the next phase of vaccination before the conclusion of the first-phase vaccination.
The Covishield vaccine has been developed jointly by the Oxford University and the AstraZeneca pharmaceutical company. The vaccines have been manufactured by the Serum Institute of India.
The District COVID-19 Vaccination Coordination Committee will monitor the vaccination in the respective districts.
Two hundred sixty-nine thousand 789 people are infected with COVID-19 while 2,011 people have died due to the coronavirus infection so far in Nepal, the Ministry of Health has stated.
KATHMANDU: An increasing number of users are found attracted towards the ‘Nagarik App’. The app was launched by the government on January 15 around the slogan ‘Support of Communication and Information Technology, Government Services in the Hands (of Citizens).’
Three hundred eleven thousand one hundred and fifty-three users have downloaded the app as of Wednesday, the national Information Technology Center said.
Only 27 per cent among the users downloading the app have been verified so far.
The Center officials shared that many complaints were received that there was no verification even after downloading the app. Along with users who have entered into the system after the verification many users have been complaining through telephone about this problem, Information Officer at the Center, Ramesh Prasad Pokharel, said.
According to Pokharel, many complaints are related to Nepal Telecom and the Ministry of Home Affairs. It is said there is a problem in verification as the SIM card the user is using at present is not registered in his/her name or due to the mistake of the Telecom employees not registering the correct spelling of the user’s name while registering the SIM card.
Similarly, many users complained that the particulars of their citizenship certificate were not matching.
Although more than 300 thousand people have downloaded the app in six days, 225 thousand or 72 per cent users have not been able to verify.
Pokharel acknowledged that although the users have been found attracted to the app which is in trial, problems have been faced in the functioning of the app due to various reasons.
It is said problem in verification is due to information like the name, surname and date of birth etc. of the user in the citizenship certificate, passport or the voter identity card not matching with the data of the same maintained by the Ministry of Home Affairs or the user using the SIM card registered in another person’s name.
The Center’s data shows that so far 31 thousand 676 users have verified their passport, 28 thousand users their voter identity card, 39 thousand 715 users their PAN number, 19 thousand 109 users have verified School Leaving Certificate (SLC) and 8,486 users higher education certificates through the app.
The government launched the app with the goal of providing services through an integrated platform by digitalizing all kinds of services provided by the government.
In the initial phase, the digital identity of a citizen is established in the app using the details of an individual retained by the Home Ministry, the Election Commission and the Department of Passport.
The plan is also to add the National Identity Card in the app in the coming days. The Ministry of Home Affairs has said it has begun developing an online system for correcting the mistakes after a majority of the users of the app complained of mistakes in the information related to their citizenship certificate.
Kathmandu: The Government of South Korea is to administer anti-coronavirus vaccination to all domestic and foreign nationals residing in its country free of cost. At a press conference held on Monday, Chief of South Korea’s Department of Disease Control and Prevention Jeong Eun-kyeong informed that all domestic and foreign nationals residing in South Korea would be freely administered the vaccine against the COVID-19.
Earlier, the Korean government had announced to freely provide vaccines only to its citizens. In the meantime, the government has made a new decision to administer anti-COVID vaccine to all foreigners residing in South Korea. With this decision coming to effect, over 50,000 Nepali presently living in South Korea will also entitle to get the vaccine free of cost.
Frontline health workers and volunteers would be put on top priority while administering the vaccine that is to kick start from coming month. Next priority would be given to senior citizens, children, helpless and people living with disabilities, it was shared in the press conference. Lately, South Korea has also confirmed the detection and wider transmission of new variant of coronavirus. Some weeks ago as many as 1,000 cases of coronavirus were diagnosed everyday in the country. But this week the number of coronavirus infection cases was lowered to 400 a day.
KATHMANDU: The country recorded a total of 348 new cases of coronavirus infection in the past 24 hours.
According to the Ministry of Health and Population, the coronavirus tally reached 2,67,992 in the country as of Tuesday afternoon.
Likewise, the Ministry shared that now the country has 3,764 reported active cases of the virus.
In the past 24 hours, altogether 441 infected people got recovery from the virus infection. So far, 2,62,259 people recovered from the coronavirus infection in the country.
Similarly, 4 persons succumbed to the virus across the country in the past 24 hours, hitting the total COVID-19 related deaths to 1,969.
KATHMANDU: President Bidya Devi Bhandari has said that a fresh mandate is essential for peace, stability, and development.
Receiving the annual report of the Election Commission, President Bhandari also said that the elections should be held on time.
“President Bhandari said that a fresh mandate is essential for peace, stability, and development, it is imperative for holding polls on announced dates. Stating that the preparations being made by the Commission are positive, President expressed confidence that the Commission would be able to work seriously and resolutely for free, fair, credible, economical and fearless elections,” reads the statement by the Election Commission.
On the occasion, Bhandari suggested that since the task of institutionalizing and strengthening democracy lies with the Election Commission, it should work towards ensuring maximum voter turnout and voting rights of all voters and making polling stations and centers voter-friendly.
The commission on Monday submitted its annual report 076/77 BS to President Bhandari as per Article 294 of the constitution.
Kathmandu: The Election Commission, Nepal (ECN) today submitted its annual report for the fiscal year, 2019/20 to President Bidya Devi Bhandari. Chief Election Commissioner Dinesh Kumar Thapaliya presented the report amid a function at the Rashtrapati Bhawan in Sheetal Niwas. The occasion was attended by also election commissioners Narendra Dahal and Ishwori Prasad Paudyal and the ECN Secretary Dev Kumari Guragain.
Kaski: Two people have died and seven others have sustained injuries when a jeep they were travelling on crashed at Yamdi on the Pokhara-Baglung Highway on Saturday evening.
Nine people were travelling on the vehicle (Ba 2 Cha 7410) heading towards Pokhara Bazar from Hemja. It veered off the road and fell some 25 metres from the road.
Prakash Pun, 50, and Chitra Pun, 52, of Pokhara metropolitan city-10, who were critically injured in the accident, died in course of treatment on Saturday night, the Kaski District Police Office said.
Prakash died at the Western Regional Hospital while Chitra breathed his last at the Manipal Hospital in Pokhara.
The injured are receiving treatment at Sahara Hospital.
With smartphones on our hands, people are way too busy keeping themselves entertained and connecting with others. And, with countless apps, especially messaging platforms, texting friends and family, sharing troubles, jokes, memes and making memories have become easier.
If you want to keep the memories alive, you can also download them and relive them, from start till end. Here is a guide regarding how to download messages from top messaging apps.
1. Messenger
Facebook’s Messenger allows its user to interact with other users worldwide by messages, voice calls, and video calls free of cost. The users can also exchange photos, videos, stickers, audio, documents, and files.
To save the chats on your mobile phone and desktop:
On Facebook, open ‘Menu’ in the top right-hand corner.
Click ‘Settings’.
Click on ‘Personal Information’.
Select the data you want to ‘Download your Information’.
Select ‘Messages’ and download.
You will get a notification on your profile when your data is ready to download.
To download messages individually
First, download message saver apps. Add all Facebook details like username and password. This will automatically sync with your chats.
Then, open the Messenger.
Click a chat, then open the ‘Messages Saver’ extension and then select the ‘From’ and ‘To’ dates that are needed to be downloaded.
Please note: You can get the free version of saved chats in the HTML format. Or depending on the app, you might have to pay to get more options for downloading it, like chats in different formats, get images, and so on.
2. WhatsApp
WhatsApp is another messaging platform owned by Facebook. The online app allows the user to send text messages, voice messages, and do video calls, absolutely free. The users have a platform to share images, audio, files, documents, share contacts, live locations, and other forms of media. All messages are protected by end-to-end encryption, ensuring security and privacy. So, a majority of people use the platform to send messages.
To download messages from WhatsApp, one can follow these steps:
Open your WhatsApp.
Then, open the individual or group chat.
Choose the ‘More’ option from three dots on the top-right corner.
Then choose ‘Export chat’ where you will have the option to choose ‘include media’ or ‘without media’. Choose what is required.
Lastly, an email will be composed with your chat history attached as a .txt document and sent to you.
Please note: While exporting with media, you can send up to 10,000 latest messages due to maximum email sizes. Without media, you can send 40,000 messages. And, you cannot export the chats via WhatsApp web, you can only do it on your mobile phones.
3. Viber
A widely used application, Viber has been well recognised around the globe. A user has a feature to communicate via text messages, voice calls, and video calls worldwide, without paying any amount. Numerous individuals use Viber for everyday purposes including business works also that one cannot afford to lose.
To save your chats, follow the steps:
Open the Viber app.
Choose ‘More’ on the bottom right, and open ‘Settings’.
Choose ‘Account’ and backup the messages by clicking the ‘Viber backup’.
To download messages, go to Viber web.
Select the chatbox you want to save.
Then, select the conversations to back up by checking the box on the left of each message.
To select all Viber messages at once, check the box next to “Messages” on top. Click ‘Export selected’. Browse for the PC location where you wish to back up the messages
If you want to receive the email of zipped CSV files. Also, you can export it to your skype id, following these steps:
Open the Viber application.
Next, click the menu button and enter the settings option in the application.
Then, click the ‘Calls and Messages’ button, out of the options that pop below.
Select the option of ‘Email Message History’. Enter your email account to receive the backup of Viber messages.
Lastly, confirm the mail you have a reception for the confirmation of backup.
4. Slack
Slack is a business communication platform that offers IRC-Internet Relay Chat (in form of text) features and allows its users to make chat rooms (channels) that can be organised as per the topic, private groups, and direct messaging. Being used at workspaces, people are more likely to be in need to save their data and information on this app.
You can do it by following the below-mentioned steps.
Open the Slack application on your desktop.
Next, click your workspace name on the top left corner and there a list of options will pop out.
From those, choose ‘Settings & administration’ from the menu.
Next, choose ‘Workspace settings’.
Next, from the right side choose ‘Import/Export Data’, then select the Export tab.
Lastly, select start ‘Export’, and when it is ready, you will be notified via email a link. You can open that link and click ‘ready to download the zip file’ (JSON format).
Please note: The free plan of Slack allows you to view and share only the 10,000 most recent messages.
Moreover, if you wish to save the chats from the phone, you can do it by simply hovering over the text or file you want to save and then click on the ‘save’ option that pops in.
5. Telegram
Another freeware app, Telegram, is an instant messaging application that provides end-to-end encrypted video calling, calls and secrets chat between users. Apart from that, it also offers to share VoIP, files, animated stickers, limitless images, documents, user locations, contacts, and music.
People can easily export chats (in JSON or HTML format), including photos and other media. To get your chats saved, you can perform the following steps:
Open Telegram app.
Then click ‘Settings’.
Choose export Telegram data and you will get all the chat data to save.
However, if you want to save individual chats, all you need to do is open the chat you want to save, then click on the three dots from the top right side and then choose the ‘Export chat history’ option to save photos, videos, files, or text messages.
To save the chats on your mobile phones (iOS and Android users), all you need to do is activate notification exceptions and that can be done by following the below-mentioned steps:
KATHMANDU: Minister for Foreign Affairs Pradeep Gyawali has said that there has not been any change in the position of Gorkha recruitment in the Indian Army.
The remarks came following reports that Nepal is rethinking a change in Gorkha recruitment policy, Indian media reports said.
In response to a question in Delhi, Gyawali said, “So far as the Gorkha recruitment in the Indian army is concerned, it is a reality and one of the important components of our relationship.” adding, “yes there are academic discussions in societies, in vibrant democracies, there may be different opinions in that regard, but so far govt of Nepal has not changed its position on this issue or made any new decision in that regard” -Khabarhub
KATHMANDU: The government is to mobilize volunteers for mitigating the damage caused by disasters.
The final preparations are made for forming the National Volunteers Bureau in line with the provisions made in the Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Act, 2074, the Disaster Risk Reduction and Management National Strategy, 2075, and the Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Regulations, 2076.
A guideline is also being prepared in this connection. Volunteer mobilization for disaster damage prevention would be the first such exercise in the country with the implementation of this guideline.
The Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Authority has prepared the draft of the ‘Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Volunteer Bureau Formation and Mobilization Guidelines, 2077’ and preparing to implement it at the earliest.
The executive body of the Authority will likely approve the guidelines in its next meeting, the Authority’s chief executive officer Anil Pokharel said. The preliminary draft of the guidelines was tabled in the Executive Committee’s meeting before this. The Home Minister chairs the executive committee.
Pokharel said the main goal of the guidelines is capacity enhancement in disaster risk reduction by mobilizing the volunteers.
Minister for Home Affairs Ram Bahadur Thapa has expressed the belief that the guidelines will help make the disaster preparedness, risk reduction, and rescue and rehabilitation programs effective.
“The proposed draft of the guidelines is in discussion process. The plan is to get it approved and implemented at the earliest,” CEO Pokharel said.
It is stated in the proposed guidelines that there would be separate institutional structure at the federal, province and local levels.
The Bureau will carry out its works in coordination with the local level and the administration offices concerned. Its structure will reach to the ward level itself.
The proposal states that the ward volunteer committee and the community volunteer groups would be formed.
