AGRA: A 34-year-old resident of Dayalbagh in Agra, who returned from the US last week, has tested positive for coronavirus. He is a student in the US and reached Agra after taking a connecting flight from Delhi on December 30.
Suffering from a bad throat, the man went for a Coivid-19 checkup at a private lab on January 3. The lab alerted the health department about the sample of the man being tested Covid-19 positive following an antigen test.
The RT-PCR test conducted by the health department confirmed the infection on Wednesday. The health department is closely monitoring his health.
Chief medical officer (CMO) of Agra district, Dr Arun Kumar Srivastava, said, “As per the government orders, the samples collected from the man have been sent for genome sequencing to the King George’s Medical University in Lucknow. It is required to identify the variant of Covid-19 that caused the infection”. “The man is experiencing mild symptoms and has been isolated at his home. Health department teams have been asked to conduct tests on his family members and those who came in contact with him. So far, 25 samples have been collected and sent for RT-PCR testing at the microbiology lab of the SN Medical College,” the CMO said.
This is the third case of Covid-19 in Agra in the last 10 days. Last week, a 40-year-old man, who returned from China, and a 48-year-old male tourist from Argentina, who had come to visit the Taj Mahal, tested Covid positive. The health department has not been able to trace the Argentina national, who was travelling with his wife. The man had provided the wrong phone number and hotel name when his samples were collected at the Western Gate of the Taj Mahal. Meanwhile, the genome sequencing report of the man who returned from China is awaited.
The CMO said, “We are focusing on the trace, test and treat policy to tackle the new variant of Covid-19. Those who have travelled to foreign countries in the last two weeks should also get themselves tested.”
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