19 more staffers of Delhi govt hospital test positive for COVID-19, total cases 59

Nineteen more staffers of the Delhi government's Babu Jagjivan Ram Memorial Hospital in Jahangirpuri tested positive for coronavirus on Sunday, taking the total number of COVID-19 cases at the facility to 59, officials said.

Till Saturday, the number of staffers infected with the virus stood at 40.

According to a senior official, 68 more samples are to be tested.

"The critically ill patients will remain in the hospital. The hospital management will take care of them," North Delhi District Magistrate Deepak Shinde said.

The hospital is located in Jahangirpuri, which is one of the containment zones in the national capital.

"All the staff members are being screened for novel coronavirus. The hospital is being sanitised," the senior official said.

"The hospital will be shut for new patients for the next three days," he said.

Eleven doctors out of the 59 patients have tested positive so far.

The first positive case at the hospital was reported on April 22, he said. Meanwhile, a staff member of Batra Hospital in south Delhi has also tested positive for COVID-19. She was working in the pharmacy of the hospital.

"Four family members are high-risk contacts and one shopkeeper is a low-risk contact. We are putting high-risk contacts under institutional quarantine and low-risk contact under home quarantine. Testing for high-risk has been done and the report is awaited," a hospital official said.