The Union Health Ministry informed the media on Wednesday that a total of 28 positive cases of coronavirus have been confirmed in India till date.
Fourteen Italian tourists who visited Rajasthan last month and one Indian man who drove the tourists around in Rajasthan have tested positive for coronavirus, Health Minister Harsh Vardhan told the media on Wednesday. These tourists were with the Italian tourist in Jaipur who on Tuesday tested positive for coronavirus and was quarantined after he was found to be infected with coronavirus. His wife has also tested positive for the virus but the results of a second test from the National Institute of Virology (NIV) in Pune are awaited. The 14 tourists have been quarantined at an ITBP (Indo Tibetan Border Police) facility in Delhi. The 14 people were a part of a tourist group who had come to India on February 21, much before people travelling from Italy were being screened, and had travelled to Rajasthan, the minister stated.
Six people in Agra have also been found to be infected by coronavirus. These six people had come in contact with the Delhi resident who was on Monday confirmed to have been infected with coronavirus. The Delhi man is a resident of Mayur Vihar and had travelled to Italy recently and tested positive on Monday. He was shifted to a quarantine ward at Safdarjung Hospital on Sunday night. Two private schools in Noida, including one where the patient’s son studies, were shut on Tuesday, while several people, including his family members, were quarantined or kept in isolation.
The condition of the 24-year-old software professional, who has been admitted to an isolation ward in Hyderabad’s Gandhi Hospital, has improved and he is stable, officials said. Efforts have been stepped up to track and bring people associated with him, including air passengers, under observation. The affected techie has been admitted to an isolation ward in the state-run Gandhi hospital in Hyderabad and is found to have come in contact with 88 people. He was in Dubai last month and worked with people from Hong Kong where he is suspected to have contracted the virus. From Dubai, he had returned to Bengaluru before travelling to Hyderabad in a bus.
Earlier, Kerala had reported three confirmed cases of the virus but all of them were discharged from hospitals last month following recovery.