6 more coronavirus cases in Tamil Nadu, as total rises to 35

Tamil Nadu has reported six new positive cases of the coronavirus, taking the total tally to 35 as of Friday afternoon. According to the National Health Mission – Tamil Nadu, five of the new patients have been in contact with confirmed COVID-19 patients. Only one 25-year-old female, a Chennai resident who was admitted to the Ariyalur Government Hospital has not been linked to an existing patient or provided any relevant travel history.

The other five patients include two members of the family of patient number 12 (54-year-old male from Madurai who died after contracting the virus), two contacts from patient number 5 (a 69-year-old male who travelled from Phuket to New Delhi and then to Erode Railway station on March 11) in Erode and one contact from patient number 14 (52-year-old female from Chennai who had returned from USA).

So far, in Tamil Nadu, 2,09,284 passengers have been screened at the Chennai, Trichy, Madurai, and Coimbatore airports. As of March 26, 15,788 passengers are under home quarantine for 28 days. In addition to this, a list of 86,644 passengers listed by the bureau of immigration are being verified in the district. Currently, 109 asymptomatic passengers from highly affected countries are being quarantined in quarantine facilities near the airport while 284 are under hospital isolation.

According to the TN Health Department’s bulletin on Thursday, 1039 samples have been taken from the passengers and sent for testing at King Institute of Preventive Medicine & Research, Guindy Chennai, National Institute of Virology, Pune, Theni VRDL, Thiruvarur VRDL, Tirunelveli VRDL, RGGGH VDRL, Coimbatore VRDL, Salem VRDL, Villupuram VRDL and Madurai VRDL.

The government of Tamil Nadu has already extended the lockdown orders till April 14, 2020 in line with the announcement made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Only essential goods and services are being allowed to remain open or transport material across districts.