5th coronavirus positive case reported in Telangana State

One more person, this time an Indonesian citizen on a visit to Karimnagar, has tested positive for COVID-19, taking the number of positive cases reported in Telangana to five.

The person was part of a group of 10 people from Indonesia who were in Karimnagar for a religious meet. The group were travelling with three Indians and they are also under quarantine at Gandhi Hospital here.

Health Minister Etala Rajender said the person had come along with the group to India on March 9 and took a train from Delhi and reached Hyderabad.

“It’s a logistical nightmare to detect persons who came in close contact with the Indonesian national. We have already informed the Union Ministry of Health about this case so that contact tracing can be taken up from their side,” he said.

The Health Minister, who reviewed the COVID-19 preparedness on Tuesday, said all the contacts of four COVID-19 positive cases have tested negative. The first COVID-19 positive patient from Hyderabad with a travel history to Dubai had 88 contacts, the second patient, a 24-year-old girl with a travel history to Italy had 42 close contacts, the third one with a travel history to Netherlands had 69 persons who came in close contact with him



while the fourth positive patient from Hyderabad with a travel history to Scotland had 11 close contacts.

“Our teams have tried their best to be meticulous and identified close contacts of all the four positive patients. All of them have tested negative. In fact, all the family members of the positive patients have tested negative. We are in the process of tracking close contacts of the Indonesian citizen,” he said.

Meanwhile, the district administration in Karimnagar has begun a door-to-door survey in areas where the Indonesian group visited to check if there were more foreigners as well as people suffering from symptoms of coronavirus.

Sources said a group of Indonesians arrived in New Delhi on February 22, and 10 of them along with three Indians arrived in Karimnagar on March 14. The group stayed in two masjids at Mukarampura and Housing Board Colony areas. In the course of their religious campaign, they also went about meeting people in some localities in the town.

With one of them testing positive for Covid-19, the district administration launched efforts to prevent the spread of the virus in areas where the Indonesians stayed and visited.