Kerala student who tested positive for virus stable, says state minister

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:The condition of the first patient of coronavirus in India is stable and she is responding well to treatment, Kerala health minister KK Shailaja said on Friday. The state government has sounded a high alert across the state.

The medical student, who returned from China’s Wuhan last week, was shifted to an isolation ward of the Thrissur Medical College Hospital for better observation from the government general hospital, health officials said.

“The condition of the student is stable. She is responding well to symptomatic treatment. We have constituted a medical board and bulletin will be issued every evening,” the minister said.

The medical college has been upgraded with a special isolation ward that can treat at least 24 patients at a time, and the doctors and paramedical staff deployed there were specially trained, Shailaja said.

She requested people not to panic and cooperate with officials. She also urged private hospitals and doctors to extend help to curb the spread of the virus.

Many people who came in direct contact with the first patient have been put under observation, increasing the number of those under observation. So far, 1471 people are under observation in the state and 20 are in isolation wards, Shailaja said. In Thrissur alone 150 people are under observation.

The virus, which has killed 213 people in China, is said to have originated from a seafood market in Wuhan.