KASARAGOD: Kerala might have checked the contagious novel coronavirus, with the only possible patient still testing positive for the virus being in Kasaragod district.
According to health officials, the patients in Thrissur and Alappuzha have tested negative at the National Institute of Virology (NIV) in Alappuzha and they are awaiting confirmation from the NIV in Pune.
In Kasaragod, the patient who arrived from Wuhan on January 27, tested positive for coronavirus twice. “We sent his swab to Alappuzha today too. Let’s see,” said a top health official in the district.
He said the directive was to test the sample every two days. “But there is no point. It will take at least 14 days for the coronavirus to die, but since we do not know the time of infection we are testing every three or four days,” he said. But the preliminary reports from Thrissur and Alappuzha give hope, health officials said.
They said they are more worried if those who came from Wuhan spread the infection in Kerala. “That means the virus has mutated to survive in the tropical climate of Kerala, and that will be a cause of worry,” an official said.
They said that was why they were strictly home-quarantining those who arrived from China and other notified countries.
In Kasaragod, 106 persons have come from notified countries, including six from Wuhan, where the outbreak happened. “One of them tested positive. The person who travelled with the infected person all the way from Wuhan to Kasaragod tested negative twice. We have sent the person home,” the official said.