KASARAGOD: The source tracing of 10 COVID-19 patients from Mangalpady, who belong to the same family, has turned into a real whodunnit in Kasaragod.
District surveillance officer Dr A T Manoj said their source of infection is 32-year-old family member who returned from Kuwait on June 10.
The returnee's initial test had come back negative but him along with his wife and mother tested positive for COVID-19 on July 11.
The health officials are treating the infection of the Kuwait returnee as an imported case. When Express contacted him over the phone, he had a different version to share.
He said he and three of his friends landed at Kannur airport on June 10, and they went straight to a vacant house to stay in quarantine.
On June 14, his samples were collected and on June 16, officials shared the negative result with him.
After staying in quarantine for 14 days in the house, he went home on June 25. "I stayed in quarantine for another seven days in my house," he said.
He came out of his room only on July 1.
"Even then I did not move around too much," he added.
The Kuwait returnee however said he could not be the source adding that his brother's wife, who lives in Meeja panchayat, was likely the one who contracted the infection first as the woman's brother who works in Mangaluru, had tested positive for coronavirus.
"But before the result was known, my sister-in-law came and stayed with us in Mangalpady," the Kuwait-returnee said.
However, the woman's samples returned negative, said Dileep, the junior health inspector of Mangalpady panchayat.
"So we really don't know the source of infection of the family," he told Express.
Hospital patient tests positive
In another case of an unknown source, a 74-year-old woman, who got admitted to the District Hospital with a hip fracture, tested positive for COVID-19.
The woman is a native of Kuniya in Pullur-Periya panchayat.
Sources said the hospital had done an antigen test before surgery. Four health workers of the hospital have gone into quarantine, the sources said.
They said 15 women in the female surgical ward have also been kept under observation.
Other cases due to local transmission
These cases include one person each from Manjeshwar, Madhur, Chemnad, and Panathady panchayat.
Two persons from Kumbla who came in a car from Mangaluru tested positive for the virus as well as another person from Kallar panchayat who returned from Bengaluru.
Four persons who arrived from abroad also tested positive for the infection.
Thursday also saw 23 persons recovering from COVID-19 in the district and Kasaragod presently has 304 active cases of the virus.