Two Indians confirmed with coronavirus in Japan's quarantined cruise ship

The Indian mission in Japan has said on February 12 that two Indian crew onboard the cruise ship Diamond Princess quarantined off Japanese coast have tested positive of deadly coronavirus. Earlier, the Japanese health ministry had said that 39 people more were confirmed to be carriers of the novel virus on the cruise ship in Japan and one was even infected. This brought the total number of coronavirus cases in the ship to 175. 

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The Diamond Princess was placed in quarantine for nearly 14 days on arriving in Yokohama, south of Tokyo on February 3 after a man who got off at Hong Kong was diagnosed with the virus which is now officially named as 'COVID-19'. Reportedly, there are nearly 3,700 people on board the cruise ship, which has the passenger capacity of 2,670 and a crew of 1,100. The Japanese health minister Katsunobu Kato reportedly expressed his suggested in the parliament that he wanted to extend the testing to all passengers and crew on board. 

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Coronavirus death toll reaches 1,113

The Indian embassy was in touch with the 138 Indians including passengers and crew members who are on board the British-flagged Diamond Princess. Meanwhile, the death toll for the coronavirus outbreak in China has reportedly jumped to 1,113 on February 12 with another 2,015 new confirmed cases, according to Hubei's health commission. The total number of confirmed cases across China are now 44,653. Hubei province, which is the epicentre of the viral outbreak, has also reported 94 new deaths.

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The outbreak took place in Wuhan in January and multiple countries have started evacuating their citizens from the country, and have decided to restrict the entry of foreigners returning from China. The virus was officially also named 'COVID-19' at a conference in Geneva held by the World Health Organisation, where the body's chief said that countries had a chance of stopping its global spread. Earlier this month, WHO also declared Coronavirus as a 'global public health emergency'.  

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(With PTI inputs)