A three-year-old has tested positive for coronavirus in Kerala’s Kochi, the first instance of a child infected with COVID-19 in India, while Jammu and Kashmir has reported its first patient, officials said on Monday.
The health ministry’s latest update said a case has been reported in Delhi and in Uttar Pradesh each. The one in Delhi had travelled to Italy and the patient from UP’s Meerut town had come in contact with the six people from Agra who had tested positive for coronavirus.
This takes the number of patients to six in Kerala and makes a total of 43 in the country.
The child, who returned from Italy via Dubai with her parents, was found to have fever during screening at the Cochin international airport. She was immediately moved to the isolation ward at Ernakulam Medical College along with her parents, Malayala Manorama reported.
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Passengers on the same flight—number EK 530 on March 7—have been asked to report to the health department for testing, the report said.
In Jammu and Kashmir, the 63-year-old woman who tested positive had a travel history to Iran and was among two patients who were declared “high viral load cases” by the administration on the weekend. Both the people are undergoing treatment at the isolation ward of the Government Medical College (GMC) hospital. They are in a stable condition, the officials said.
Meanwhile, reports said a 76-year-old man who recently returned from Iran has died in Ladakh after showing symptoms associated with the coronavirus.
He was one of two patients who was quarantined in Ladakh, Indian Express reported, and his blood samples have been sent for testing. “The patient had multiple ailments and was hospitalised a few days ago. We have sent the samples for testing and the result is awaited,” said a health official told the daily.
In Karnataka, police is looking for a man who arrived at the airport in Mangaluru from Dubai and was admitted to the isolation ward of a hospital with symptoms of coronavirus but went early Monday missing, multiple reports said.
Patients in India
The number of COVID-19 cases in India, which was just six till last Tuesday, includes 16 Italians as well as three Kerala patients who were discharged last month following their recovery.
On Sunday, five people tested positive in Kerala, including a couple and their son who had flown from Italy and authorities say evaded airport screening, prompting the Kerala health minister to warn of action against those hiding travel history.
Educational institutions in Pathanamthitta are closed for three days.
Other states too introduced stricter measures to check the spread of the disease.
After Sikkim, the Arunachal Pradesh government has also decided to temporarily suspend issuing Protected Area Permits (PAPs) to foreigners to check the spread of coronavirus.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said his government will request the Centre to impose a ban on travelling to countries that have recorded a large number of coronavirus cases.
The Delhi government has ordered DTC and cluster buses, metro and hospitals to be disinfected on a regular basis as a precautionary measure to deal with novel coronavirus, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said on Sunday.
Twenty-seven people, who came into contact with a 45-year-old coronavirus patient in Tamil Nadu, have been placed under home surveillance, Health Secretary Beela Rajesh said here on Sunday.
In Assam at least 400 people have been quarantined after they came in contact with an American tourist who tested positive for the new coronavirus in Bhutan after travelling through the state recently, state Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said.
The Centre denied entry to cruise ships till March 31 in the wake of the coronavirus scare.
Meanwhile, external affairs minister S Jaishankar said no cases of the virus have been reported among the Indian fishermen stranded in Iran.