A Covid-19
A positive woman who reportedly managed to give the slip to Delhi authorities and reach AP by train after arriving from the UK recently was picked up by Rajamahendravaram and taken to hospital with her son, officials said Thursday with
Her swab samples will be sent to the National Institute of Virology in Pune to see if she has contracted the new strain COVID-19, discovered in the UK, said a health department official.
The country is on high alert after the new virulent, “runaway” strain of is discovered Coronavirus in the UK and has taken various measures including rigorous testing of those who had recently arrived from England.
The woman, who reached her hometown of Rajamahendravaram in Andhra Pradesh after allegedly escaping a quarantine facility in New Delhi, was arrested by railroad police and health officials and taken to a local hospital after midnight Wednesday.
However, according to official information, the woman here informed the authorities that she was only recommended to quarantine at home and as such she left New Delhi alone as she was asymptomatic.
Her son, who went to the state capital to pick her up, was also hospitalized and they were both placed in isolated rooms.
The woman who worked as a teacher in the UK returned to India on December 21st, ending up in New Delhi. She tested positive COVID-19 and kept there in a quarantine facility. However, she is said to have fled from there and, accompanied by her son, brought the AP Express to Rajamahendravaram.
Alerted by the Delhi police, the railway police found they were traveling on the first class bus on AP Express and the information was forwarded to the authorities in Rajamahendravaram.
When the mother and son reached town around midnight on Wednesday, the waiting health authorities took them to the hospital according to the protocols. No case has been recorded against her, officials said.
East Godavari District Health Coordinator T Ramesh Kishore said the woman was asymptomatic but they were collecting fresh samples to see if the new one was Coronavirus Tribe infected them.
“We’re sending the samples to NIV, Pune, for testing, and we’re keeping the woman and son in isolation in the meantime,” he told PTI on the phone.
There was still no official word on the woman’s fellow passengers on AP Express. This was the first time a person returned to AP from the UK after the new one Coronavirus Strain was detected
and new protocols have been introduced to screen such travelers.
The Department of Civil Aviation suspended all flights between India and the UK from December 23rd to December 31st on Monday after the new strain of the deadly virus was discovered.