Corona infection has now spread to North Bengal even as the State on Sunday recorded its first infection within the medical fraternity with a doctor getting infected by the dread virus.
The doctor posted in the Alipore Army Command Hospital had a travel history to Delhi, sources said adding he might have contacted the disease in the national Capital.
The second infection was recorded in North Bengal where a middle-aged woman from Kalimpong was found suffering from the disease. She too is known to have travelled to Delhi, sources said adding the administration is looking for the people — including doctors both at the Himalayan hill station where she belongs to and Siliguri where she came for treatment — with whom she associated in the past one week or so.
Sunday’s new cases take up the total number of infected people in Bengal to 19.
In a separate incident where a Delhi-based family with a history of Corona infection had defied quarantine orders to visit Tehatta sub-division of Nadia district has been brought to Kolkata for treatment.
Out of the five persons brought to Kolkata three have tested positive. Apart from this another 19 people have been traced with whom the family had interacted. They have been quarantined.
The Government is trying to locate maximum number of people with whom the alleged reckless family had come in contact with while it was travelling from Delhi to Nadia — first by the Rajdhani Express and then by a crowded passenger train.
The members of the family from Govindpuri area of Delhi had flouted quarantine norms despite being asked by the doctors who had diagnosed one member of the same family with Corona infection. The patient is undergoing treatment in the national Capital.
“We are desperately trying to stop community infection. Till now we have no such report. But with the people behaving so irresponsibly it is getting very difficult for the Government to handle things,” a senior Health Department official said.
Notwithstanding a rise in Corona infected cases at least four patients showed signs of recovery Health Department sources said on Sunday. The son of the senior bureaucrat who had indulged him to flout quarantine directives before testing positive was on the path of recovery, sources said adding a second youth and his father from Ballygunge were also recovering from the disease. The health of a fourth patient a woman from Habra in North 24 Parganas was also improving with all the four patients testing negative in their first test after more than a week’s treatment.
With all these patients getting treated at Beleghata Infectious Disease Hospital the Health Department on Sunday issued a circular asking all other hospitals to follow the procedures adopted by the ID Hospital.
Meanwhile Prime Minister Narendra Modi has praised Mamata Banerjee for the initiative she has taken to contain the spread of Corona virus in Bengal. Modi who called up the Chief Minister on Friday and spoke the Chief Minister for more than 10 minutes appreciated the way she was handling the crisis, Nabanna (Secretariat) sources said adding soon after Modi’s call Home Minister Amit Shah and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar too called up Banerjee to take stock of the situation.