Ranchi Superintendent of Police Saurav and his wife have been quarantined in Patna amid Coronavirus scare after the couple returned from a vacation in Italy, officials from the police headquarters in Ranchi said on Sunday. The couple, which visited Italy for a 10-day vacation and landed in Patna on Saturday, was taken to the Isolation Ward of Patna Medical College and Hospital (PMCH) as a precautionary measure, sources said.
“The Ranchi SP volunteered to stay under observation in Patna as he returned from Coronavirus-hit Italy. He has not shown any symptoms of the viral infection and is healthy at the moment,” Spokesperson of Jharkhand Police, Additional Director General of Police Saket Kumar Singh said. Saurav, who goes by one name, could not be reached over phone on Sunday.
With death toll rising above 1400, Italy has become the epicentre of the lethal Novel Coronavirus in Europe. The European country has reported at least 20,000 cases of Coronavirus and has become one of the major concerns due to the high flow of tourists to the country. The virus is contagious and can be passed on from one person to another either through direct contact or breathing in close proximity, say doctors.
Meanwhile, a Ranchi resident, who returned from Netherland on Sunday, was admitted in the Isolation Ward of Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) in Ranchi. The doctors at the hospital collected his samples for laboratory tests and allowed him to stay in a 14-day home quarantine at his residence. As per the protocol, doctors cannot disclose the identity of the person.
While the virus has claimed over 5000 lives across theglobe, primarily in Italy and China, it has affected more than 80 people inIndia and caused two deaths. No cases of Coronavirus have been reported inJharkhand so far. However, nearly 100 people here are under observation afterreturning from countries affected by the virus.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared Coronavirus a global pandemic.
Meanwhile, the Government has asked all State-run hospitals to stock sufficient masks and other products used for protection against Coronavirus.
RIMS has arranged for 450 pieces of N95 masks and all State-run hospitals have set up special isolation wards for patients infected by the virus. Doctors say that three-layered surgical masks are as effective as N95 masks in protection against the virus.N95 masks, they say, are only meant for use by medical practitioners and caregivers.
According to the official website of the World Health Organisation (WHO), on December 31, WHO was alerted to several cases of pneumonia in Wuhan City, Hubei Province of China. The virus did not match any other known virus. This raised concern because when a virus is new, it is not known how it may affect people, One week later, on January 7, Chinese authorities confirmed that they had identified a new virus.
The new virus is a coronavirus, which is a family of viruses that include the common cold, and viruses such as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS). This new virus was temporarily named 2019-nCoV.