CURRENT AFFAIRS

 

 

TOPICS :

• I2U2 Summit

• India’s first HPV Vaccine for Cervical Cancer

• Monkey pox disease

• Global gender gap report 2022

• Flag code of India

• Super moon

 

 

I2U2 Summit

Context:

First ever I2U2 summit has taken place virtually on 14^th July 2022.

I2U2:

• I2U2 stands for India, Israel, UAE, US.
• Sometimes it is also called as “west Asian Quad”.
• It was conceptualized in October 2021, during the ‘International Forum for Economic Cooperation’ which was foreign minister level meeting of these 4 countries.
• Since then, members had sherpa level meetings regularly.
• The forming of group was followed by the signing of “Abraham Accords” between Israel and UAE in 2020.
• It was formed in order to deal with the issues in areas of Maritime Security, infrastructure and transport in the region.
• Aim: “to discuss common areas of mutual interest, to strengthen the economic partnership in trade and investment in respective regions of member nations and beyond.
• And also aims to security cooperation among the member nations.

Areas of Cooperation:

The countries mutually agreed upon six areas of cooperation. They are,

Water, energy, transportation, space, health and food security.

I2U2 First Summit:

• In the 1^st summit PM Narendra Modi, US president Joe Biden, Israeli PM Yair lapid and UAE president Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan have participated.
• In the meeting the main focus is on food security crisis and clean energy. Long term solutions and Innovative ways to deal with global food shocks by diversified food production and food delivery systems have been discussed.
• In order to tackle the food insecurity in south Asia and middle East UAE has announced USD 2billion investment for developing a series of integrated food parks across India as part of efforts by I2U2.
• These food parks will incorporate state of art climate-smart technologies to reduce food waste and spoilage, water conservation, and employ renewable energy sources.
• The I2U2 in a joint statement said that the group will advance a hybrid renewable energy project consisting of 300MW of wind and solar capacity, complimented by energy storage system.
• This hybrid renewable energy project will contribute to the India’s goal of achieving the 500GW non fossil fuel capacity by 2030.

India and I2U2:

• India has massive consumer market and the high production facility of or high tech and highly sought goods, which makes India benefitting from this grouping.
• The ties between India and Israel gets deepened.
• This group will facilitate in building the political and social alliances.
• It also helps in the simultaneous engagement of with both Israel without risking UAE ties because of Abraham accords.

Abraham Accords:

• The Abraham Accords is a peace deal which was signed between UAE and Israel with the mediation of USA in 2020.
• It opened a new chapter in diplomatic relations between Israel and UAE.
• By this agreement UAE became the 3^rd Arab nation to normalize relations with Israel, after Egypt (1979) and Jordan (1994).

 

India’s first HPV Vaccine for Cervical Cancer

Context:                                                                                                               

Drug controller general of India has recently approved the India’s first quadrivalent human papillomavirus vaccine (qHPV) for cervical cancer.

About cervical cancer:

• Cervical cancer is a type of cancer that occurs in the cells of cervix.
• It is a sexually transmitted infection.
• Long lasting infection with certain types of HPV is the main cause.
• Cervical cancer is preventable, yet one woman dies every 8 minutes in the country.
• Early detection managing can prevent this.
• Globally cervical cancer is the second most cancer type and 2^nd most common cause of death in reproductive age group women.
• According to WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC-WHO), India is witnessing 1.23 lakh cases and 67,000 deaths annually.

qHPV vaccine:

• The Serum Institute of India (SII) has created a vaccine Cervavac a quadrivalent human papillomavirus vaccine (qHPV) to treat cervical cancer.
• This vaccine is based on VLP( virus like particles)which is similar to that of the Hepatitis B vaccine.
• It provides protection against the HPV virus’s L1 protein.
• Earlier, two vaccines licensed globally are Gardasil a quadrivalent vaccine and cervarix a bivalent vaccine are available in India.
• A quadrivalent vaccine is a vaccine which works by stimulating an immune response against four different antigens, such as four different viruses or other microorganisms.
• Right age to administer the vaccine is 9-14 years.
• Efficacy of this vaccine at the age 9-14 is 90%.
• It is highly effective if it is given before the person is sexually active.

 

Monkey pox disease

Context:

India has registered the first monkeypox case in Kerala on 14^th July.

Monkey Pox:

• Monkeypox is a viral zoonotic disease which exhibits the similar symptoms as of small pox with less severity.
• It is rare disease caused by the infection with the monkeypox virus.
• Monkeypox virus belongs to the same family of small pox.
• It was first discovered in 1958 when two outbreaks of a pox-like disease occurred in colonies of monkeys kept for research. Hence the name.

Symptoms of Monkeypox:

• Monkeypox begins with fever, headache, muscle aches, back ache, and exhaustion.
• It also causes the swelling of lymph nodes, it is a characteristic feature of monkeypox disease.
• Incubation period is generally of 7-14 days but it can range from 5-21 days.
• Transmission: It transmits from person-person through direct contact with the infectious rash, scabs, or body fluids.
• Vulnerability: Anyone can get monkeypox in Africa there are more cases of children of under age 15. Outside Africa, bisexual, or other men who have sex with men constitutes the major number of cases.
• Treatment: There is no proven treatment for the monkeypox. But WHO has recommended the supportive treatment based on the symptoms.
• an antiviral developed to treat smallpox (tecovirimat, commercialized as TPOXX) has been approved for treatment of monkeypox.
• Vaccination: there is no vaccine developed for monkeypox directly as of now, but the vaccines for smallpox can be used against monkeypox, as they belong to same family.

 

Global gender gap report 2022

Context:

World economic forum has released the Global Gender Gap Report 2022.

About Global Gender Gap Report:

• Global gender gap report has been first started in 2006 by world economic forum.
• The index is designed to measure the gender equality.
• It measures the gender-based differences in the accessing of resources and opportunities in countries.
• Global gender gap index tracks the world’s progress towards the gender parity across four key dimensions,
• Economic participation and opportunity,
• Educational attainment,
• Health and survival, and
• Political empowerment.
• It measures the scores on a 0- 100 scale which can be interpreted as the distance covered towards parity or the percentage of the gender gap that has been closed.

Highlights of the Global Gender Gap Index 2022:

• India ranks 135 out of 146 in global gender gap index with a score of 0.629
• India ranked 146 in health and survival, 143 in economic participation and opportunity, 107 in educational attainment and 48 in political empowerment.
• In 2022 the global gender gap has been closed by 68.1%.
• The report says that it will take 132 years from now to reach full parity, as the gap reduced by only 4 years since 2021.

 India neighbourhood:

• The neighbouring countries Bangladesh (71), Nepal (96), Sri Lanka (110), Maldives (117), and Bhutan (126) have performed better than India.
• Whereas only the countries Iran (143), Pakistan (145), Afghanistan (146) which are the bottom countries in the list are behind India in it’s neighbourhood.

India performance in different sub-indices:

• Economic participation and opportunity:
• It deals with the percentage of women in labour force, waging disparities etc.
• India ranked 143 which is just above the Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan.
• India has scored much below than the global average.
• Health and survival:
• it deals with sex ratio at birth, healthy life expectancy
• India ranked worse at 146. Which least among all.
• Educational attainment:
• it deals with the literacy rate, enrolment rates in all levels of education.
• India is ranked 107^th, it’s score has slightly decreased compared with Last year.
• Political empowerment:
• it deals with percentage of women in politics and in ministerial positions.
• Ranked 48^th in this sub index is highest rank for India in all sub-indices.
• Despite the rank is high the score is very lower than the other countries in that category.

 

Flag code of India

Context:

The flag code of India has been recently amended.

Flag code of India:

• Flag code of India came into effect on 26^th February 2002.
• It brings all the laws, conventions, practices and instructions for the display of the national flag together under one code.
• According to this code there is no restriction on the display of the national flag by general public, private organisations, educational institutions etc.

 Recent Amendment:

• The flag code of India 2002 was amended on 30^th December 2021.
• As per the amendment, National flag made of polyester or machine mad flag have also been allowed.
• Hence, at present national flag shall be made of hand-spun, hand-woven, machine made/polyester/wool/silk/cotton/khadi bunting .
• This was done in order to facilitate the government campaign ‘ Har Ghar Tiranga’ nationwide campaign to encourage people to hoist the tricolour at their homes to mark 75^th

 

Super moon

Context:

Brightest and largest supermoon of the 2022 has appeared on 13^th July.

Supermoon:

• Supermoon appears larger than the usual moon in night sky.
• The super moon occurs when the full moon coincides with moon’s closest position Earth in it’s orbit.
• As a result of the closest position of full moon it appears bigger in size. Hence it is called as Supermoon

 Blood moon:

• Blood moon is name given because of the red glow of the moon.
• The blood moon occurs during the total lunar eclipse.
• During a total lunar eclipse, earth lines up between the Moon and the Sun covering the moon from sunlight.
• At that time, the only a little bit of light from sunrises and sunsets of the Earth falls on the moons surface.
• Because of stretching of light waves, they look red. As a result of this red-light, moon appears to be red.

Harvest Moon:

• The full and bright moon that occurs closer to the start of autumn.
• It is given this name as the moonlight that occurs early in the evenings, leaving farmers with more time to harvest their summer grown crops.

UPSC Civil Services Daily Current Affairs 15th July 2022

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