Three from Pune test positive for Covid at airport
Between December 24 and January 1, six patients have tested positive out of which three are from Pune, said officials
As Covid-19 checking at the airport has been increasing, between December 24 and January 1, six patients have tested positive out of which three are from Pune, said officials.
Dr Pradeep Awate, surveillance officer with the state health department, said that so far six patients have tested positive for Covid-19.
“Out of these six RT-PCR positive patients to date, three are from Pune, two from Navi Mumbai and one from Goa so far. At least 1,36,447 international patients arrived at the airport so far, of which 2,895 passengers have undergone RT-PCR tests. And six out of them have tested positive,” said Dr Awate.
He added that all positive samples are sent for whole genome sequencing (WGS).
“On the background of international scenario of Covid-19, screening of international passengers arriving at Mumbai, Pune and Nagpur airports started on December 24, 2022. All passengers are being thermally scanned and two per cent random samples are taken for Covid testing. All positive samples are referred for WGS,” said Dr Awate.
As per the state health department, 16 new cases were reported in the state with no deaths reported in Maharashtra on Sunday. The case fatality rate in the state is 1.82%.
In Pune district, eight new cases of Covid were reported on Sunday with no deaths in the district.
Dr Rajesh Karyakarte, Maharashtra coordinator of genome sequencing, said that in the last set of genome sequencing the dominant variants were XBB recombinant and BA.2.75 variant of Omicron.
“The samples needed for genome sequencing are less as the overall testing has reduced. But we are sequencing all samples that we get to understand the variant situation. Right now, only XBB and BA.2.75 are dominant in the sequencing samples,” said Dr Karyakarte.