Kerala: Second coronavirus patient discharged from hospital, to be under home isolation for 10 days
The student was discharged after two consecutive test results came negative.
An Indian student admitted to a hospital in Kerala with novel coronavirus was discharged on Sunday, ANI reported, citing the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. The student was discharged after two consecutive test results came negative.
Altogether, three positive coronavirus cases in India till now have been reported from the southern state. The student from Kasargod is the second patient to be discharged in the last four days. The patient will, however, be under home isolation for 10 days.
The student had been in quarantine for 18 days. “She is stable and doesn’t have any health issues now,” Kasargode District Medical Officer in charge Dr Ramdas AV told The News Minute. “There is no need for any medication either.”
More than 2,000 people are still under observation for the virus in the state, reported The Hindu. Of the 2,210 people under surveillance in several districts, 16 people were in isolation wards in hospitals and the remaining 2,194 are in home quarantine, said Kerala Health Minister KK Shailaja. Of the 415 samples sent for testing to Pune, a total of 396 turned out to be negative and the results of the remaining were awaited.
On Thursday, a medical student was discharged after his two consecutive samples sent for testing at the National Institute of Virology in Pune turned out to be negative. India’s first coronavirus case, a woman from Thrissur, is still awaiting test results from Pune. Last week, the patient’s samples screened at a centre in Alappuzha came back negative. “We are waiting for the test result of the student admitted to Thrissur Medical College Hospital,” an unidentified official told The Hindu.
The virus, officially called COVID-19, is believed to have originated in a live seafood market in Wuhan. It has claimed 1,770 lives in China. As of Sunday midnight, over 70,000 confirmed cases of the disease were reported from the country.
The coronavirus is considered to have originated in a live seafood market in the province’s Wuhan city. Infection symptoms include fever, cough, and shortness of breath. It causes respiratory illness, and is similar to the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS, which had also emerged from China in 2002. SARS killed 774 people around the world. Infection symptoms include fever, cough, and shortness of breath. It causes respiratory illness, and is similar to the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS, which had also emerged from China in 2002. SARS killed 774 people around the world.
Meanwhile, 406 people quarantined at an Indo Tibetan Border Police facility in Delhi have tested negative for the virus. The final samples of all those quarantined after being evacuated from China’s Wuhan city were collated by a team of doctors on Friday. They are expected to be discharged from Monday onwards on the basis of the health ministry’s advisory as per due medical procedure.
Indian Ambassador to China Vikram Misri on Sunday expressed his solidarity with the Chinese government and its people, who have been battling the outbreak. “As a concrete step to tackle the outbreak, India will soon send a consignment of medical supplies to China,” he said. Beijing had said that it required medical masks, gloves, and suits for staff attending to the virus-affected patients. Masks have also become scarce in the country due to a spike in demand.
“India will do everything within its means to support the people of China in this hour of crisis,” Misri said. He noted that the country’s Wuhan city in Hubei province is the worst-affected region, and said they have a “very special place” in the hearts of Indians.