40 healthcare staff at AIIMS gastro dept in self-quarantine

Around 40 healthcare staff, including doctors and nurses working at the gastroenterology department in AIIMS, have been advised self-quarantine after a 30-year-old male nurse working with them tested positive for COVID-19, official sources said on Friday.

Contact tracing was immediately initiated and samples of these 40 healthcare workers along with some patients from the ward where the nurse was posted were sent for testing.

"Test results of around 22 people have come out which includes the results of four ICU patients. They are negative. Results of the rest are awaited," a doctor said.

According to the doctor, the nurse had fever on Saturday and had approached the doctors on phone in the clinic for AIIMS' employees the same evening.

He was advised to come for testing on Monday.

"As he was having post duty off on Monday, he went for testing on Wednesday and his results came out to be positive on Wednesday night. Everybody came to know about this on Thursday," the doctor said.

The male nurse, a resident of Chhattarpur here, is undergoing treatment at AIIMS.

On Thursday, the kitchen of the mess of the Lok Nayak Hospital (LNJP) Hospital was closed till further orders after a dietician associated with the mess tested positive for coronavirus infection.

The LNJP Hospital is a dedicated COVID-19 facility in Delhi.

The death toll due to COVID-19 rose to 718 and the number of cases climbed to 23,077 in the country on Friday, according to the Union Health Ministry.

However, a PTI tally of the figures reported by various states as on Thursday showed 722 deaths in the country.

There has been a lag in the Union Health Ministry figures, compared to the number of deaths announced by different states, which officials attribute to procedural delays in assigning the cases to individual states.