Days after being classified as a Green zone for COVID-19 outbreak, Kottayam is back in focus again with a 65-year-old woman from the district being tested positive for the virus. The woman, who had landed in New Delhi from Australia on March 20, had reached the State border at Kambamettu in Idukki on April 16 and was put on home quarantine. A virology examination of her serum sample, collected at the Taluk Hospital in Nedumkandam, has now been tested positive.
Meanwhile, the patient’s husband who had travelled along with her from the national capital by the same car has tested negative for the virus.
The woman is currently admitted to the corona care centre at Kambamettu and may soon be shifted to the Government Medical College in Kottayam, officials say.
17 people
At the same time, the Health authorities carried out a massive search operation and traced 17 persons, who had come into direct contact with a fellow traveller of a COVID-19 patient.
The episode began to unfold on Tuesday midnight when the Health Department official received information about the person, a truck driver who had come to Kottayam with a load of watermelons from Dindivanam in Tamil Nadu.
The truck driver travelled till Palakkad with a person who had tested positive for the disease and was undergoing treatment there. By the time they traced the truck driver, the person had already returned from Kottayam after disembarking the load at the marketplace here. He was soon shifted to Ernakulam General Hospital for sample collection and then to Palakkad General Hospital.
Based on the inputs received from him, the Health officials also traced the 17 persons comprising the owner and employees of a shop and head load workers at the Kottayam market who had come into direct contact with the person and asked then to remain in home quarantine. The primary samples collected from these persons have been sent for a virology examination and the results are expected to come by Thursday.
