A British tourist has become the first person to die from coronavirus in Cape Verde.
Cape Verdian Health Minister Arlindo do Rosario confirmed the tragic news today.
The unnamed man, the island country’s first confirmed coronavirus case, died in hospital around 11pm local time on Monday.
He was taken ill after checking into the five-star Hotel Riu Karamboa on Boa Vista, one of the archipelago’s most visited islands, on March 9.
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He was admitted to Sal Rei Hospital on March 16 where he failed to recover from the killer virus.
Health chiefs confirmed after the holidaymaker tested positive that the hotel would go into a 14-day lockdown with 640 tourists and 210 staff inside.
Cape Verde’s Prime Minister subsequently announced the island of Boa Vista would also go into lockdown.
A 60-year-old Dutch woman at the hotel subsequently tested positive for coronavirus and her husband is being tested after starting to show the symptoms.
The Hotel Riu Karamboa complex is located on a white sandy beach a short distance from Boa Vista’s airport.
A partner of the dead Brit, whose nationality is not known, was said today to be showing no signs of coronavirus and is understood to have tested negative so far.
