COVID-19 cases rise to 50 in U'khand

The count of COVID-19 cases in Uttarakhand has risen to 50 with two more persons, including a nursing staff at AIIMS Rishikesh, testing positive for coronavirus.

A 28-year-old member of the nursing staff at AIIMS, Rishikesh and a 32-year-old woman who recently delivered a child at the Doon Hospital tested positive for coronavirus late on Saturday night, Additional Secretary (Health) Yugal Kishore Pant said.

Both the mother and child have been kept at the isolation ward of the Doon Hospital, he said.

Fifty-six per cent of the positive cases have been cured with 28 patients discharged after delivery, he said.

None of those under treatment for COVID-19 in different hospitals of the state are in the ICU or in need of a ventilator, Pant said.

The nursing officer who has tested positive worked in the OPD of the Urology Department of AIIMS, Rishikesh.

He felt symptoms of coronavirus on April 24 and his test reports came in late on Saturday night.

Swab samples of all the staff at the ward where he worked have been taken and they have all been quarantined, Dean of AIIMS, Rishikesh UB Mishra said. New patients are not being admitted at the ward, he said.

The nursing officer seems to have contracted the infection from some asymptomatic person.

He lived in a house on rent in Bees Bigha colony of Bapu gram near the IDPL premises in town.

SP (rural) Premendra Dobal said contact tracing is being done to identify people who came in contact with the health worker.