Another UK-returned Delhi resident tests positive for COVID-19

A UK-returned man in Dwarka area has been found positive for COVID-19 and his family has been quarantined while tracing of others who came in contact with him was underway, officials said on Thursday. Earlier, another person who recently arrived from the UK had tested positive in south east Delhi on Wednesday.

The district authorities have deployed teams to contact those who have returned from the UK in the past four weeks and ensure that they undergo RTPCR tests if they show any symptoms, said a senior government official. "The passenger who was found positive in Dwarka area of South West district came to India from UK on December 19," he said.

The patient was shifted to the special facility at the LNJP hospital here where genome testing will be conducted to identify the strain of the virus, he said. His family members have been quarantined and those persons who came in contact with him are being traced, the officer said.

The passengers who have returned to India from the UK - where a mutated, highly infectious strain of the coronavirus has emerged since November 25 are being contacted and tested by the district-level teams. Total 85 persons in south west Delhi who returned from the UK in the past few weeks have to undergo RTPCR tests. Test analysis of 38 out of 52 who were tested was available, officials said.

In northeast Delhi, all the nine persons who came back from the UK between November 25 and December 21 underwent RTPCR tests and were found negative. In west Delhi, 55 such persons were tested and all were negative, they said. Delhi Health minister Satyendar Jain said on Wednesday that tracing and testing of all those who travelled to Delhi from the UK in the past two weeks will be ensured.

“Delhi Government is aware, and all the people who have travelled from the UK to Delhi in the past two weeks will be traced, tested and advised quarantine," he had said in a statement.

The authorities have enhanced monitoring of the city's residents who returned in the past few weeks from the UK to prevent any violation of home isolation, Delhi government officials said on Wednesday. Teams of health department and civil defence volunteers have been deployed at the district-level to keep watch on those persons who returned from the UK in the last two weeks and tested negative but have to undergo home isolation.

The government has set up a separate facility at the LNJP hospital for those passengers from UK who are found coronavirus-positive in RTPCR tests conducted at IGI airport, for their treatment and genomic testing, officials said. Besides, a five-star hotel in Aerocity near the airport has been earmarked as a paid quarantine facility, while a Covid care centre in south Delhi will serve as a free institutional isolation facility for passengers from flights in which positive cases are detected, they said. Those passengers who have returned from the UK in the past few weeks and have been found negative will undergo two weeks home isolation followed by another two weeks period under observation, officials said.