With 22 of the 151 positive cases, including the 75-year-old person who succumbed to the infection in Bagalkot on Friday, not having any foreign travel or contact history, the State health officials are at a loss to understand how they could have contracted the infection.
While these 22 cases, whose detailed investigation is still under process, raise questions as to whether it is the beginning of community transmission in the State, officials have been continuously denying it. These 22 people have so far spread the infection to eight others. Also, as a precautionary measure, hundreds of their secondary contacts have been isolated in their homes.
For instance, despite detailed investigation, health officials have still been unable to find out the cause of infection in the Nanjangud case of a pharma company employee, who is the first of the 17 who tested positive there.
The 35-year-old person (patient number 52), who did not have any foreign travel or contact history, tested positive on March 26. Subsequently, 14 more employees from the same company got infected and tested positive “simultaneously”.
While officials said that three of the 14 employees were in close contact with patient 52, it is still not clear how the remaining 11, who were neither his contacts nor had any independent travel history, got the infection. Patient 52 also spread the infection to three of his relatives. Last Thursday, two roommates of one of these 11 employees also tested positive.
On Saturday, two more persons from Mysuru (aged 39 and 40), with no foreign travel or contact history, tested positive too. Sources said Mysuru has now become a “cluster hotspot” and aggressive prevention measures should be taken to further stop the spread.
Similarly, on March 10, a 10-month-old baby from Dakshina Kannada, who tested positive, is also one such case that officials are concerned about. The baby or his parents did not have any foreign travel history. The only possibility is that the baby’s mother and grandmother had taken him to Kerala to a relative’s house. It is learnt that the relative did not have any travel or contact history.
Likewise, on March 31, three members of a family from Hosapete tested positive. While they also did not have any foreign travel or contact history, officials said they travelled by train to Bengaluru via Davangere and returned to Hosapete after two days. On Saturday, another 47-year-old woman from Hosapete tested positive.
In Bengaluru, a 62-year-old woman and a 24-year-old male who did not have any foreign travel or contact history have tested positive. On Saturday, the 62-year-old woman’s son also got infected.
Admitting that tracing the cause of infection in some of the positive cases has become “complicated”, Jawaid Akhtar, Additional Chief Secretary (Health and Family Welfare), told The Hindu that the officials were very close to finding the cause of infection in the Nanjangud pharma company employee case. “We have found some clues. However, it is too early to term this spread as community transmission. But what is important is our containment measures are on track,” he said.
Looking for clues in material
Suspecting that the Nanjangud pharma company employee, who tested positive for COVID-19, could have contracted the infection through packages that the company had got from China, the Health Department got swabs of the packages tested. As this tested negative, the department is now getting the raw material that was supplied to the company from China tested. “We have asked NIV, Pune, to test the samples and are awaiting reports. It may take two to three days,” a top official said.