Coronavirus scare: Collect travel details of people, Dakshina Kannada administration tells physicians

MANGALURU: Dakshina Kannada district administration on Thursday directed all private medical practitioners to collect travel details of people who come to them for treatment.
The physicians have also been directed to report details of passengers who have travelled to any of the 115 nations officially covered under WHOs list of nations affected by Covid-19 to the authorities.WHO has declared Covid-19 as a pandemic and issued guidelines to combat it.
Teams have been set up at primary health centre-level to identify passengers who have come from abroad and screen them. The administration has also decided to screen passengers who come to the city from Lakshadweep via the passenger ferry service. Sindhu B Rupesh, deputy commissioner urged people with signs of fever, cough, cold to avoid thickly populated areas till they are completely cured and also obtain medical advise on their condition.
On Thursday, authorities screened 614 international passengers at Mangaluru International Airport. Fifty passengers are presently in self-quarantine for the mandated 14-days.
Eleven passengers have completed this self-quarantine period and have been declared negative of Covid-19, DC said. The administration has sent swabs of five people for tests on Thursday and received reports on three, all of which have been negative for Covid-19.
If international passengers with fever, cold, cough that are symptomatic with Covid-19, they will be kept in home quarantine and under medical watch for 28 days. Swab samples, where found necessary will be sent for testing and if a report comes Covid-19 positive, such people will be shifted to any of the eight isolation facilities including seven opened in as many medical colleges. ESI hospital will be turned into isolation facility if need for it arises, DC said.