In the latest news coming from Pimpri in Maharashtra, 40 surgeons have been shifted to Quarantine facility after they performed a surgery on a Tablighi Jamaat attendee. The patient had earlier hid his travel history.
On Saturday night, following the results turning out to be positive for the novel coronavirus, the patient was shifted to YCM Hospital in Pimpri. After the patient was tested positive, the throat swab samples of 40 surgeons were immediately sent for the COVID-19 test to the National Institute of Virology, Pune. All the 40 surgeons have been quarantined on different floors of the hospital.
The patient is an autorickshaw driver from Khadki who met with an accident and was immediately taken to the hospital on the 31st of March. The patient had suffered sustained internal bleeding. Emergency surgery was to be performed. After two days, the patient developed a fever and only then the doctors questioned the patient’s mother who revealed that the patient had attended the Tablighi Jamaat Congregation in Delhi.
Patient deliberately hid travel history
An official from the hospital said that, when the patient was admitted, the hospital did ask for the travel history but the family refused to reveal. It was only after the confirmation of no travel history to coronavirus hotspots that the team of 40 surgeons performed a surgery that involved resection of a part of his damaged intestine.
The suspicion arose when the patient developed a fever. Upon questioning, it was known that the patient had traveled to the Jamaat. The throat swab samples of the patient were immediately sent to the NIV. After the result turned out to be positive, the 40 surgeons’ samples were also sent after they were shifted to a quarantining facility. Another 30 staff, including nurses and cleaners, who have been exposed to the patient were also quarantined. Their samples were also sent.
In a similar incident, after Mumbai’s Wockhardt hospital’s 26 nurses and 3 doctors tested positive for the novel coronavirus, the hospital was sealed and termed as a ‘Containment zone.’ According to a BMC official, only after every staff tests negative for the COVID-19, the hospital will be opened to the public.
