Over 100 positive cases have been reported from the district in the past 12 days. Results of 149 samples are awaited.

A staff nurse and a seafarer tested positive for novel coronavirus in Panchkula Wednesday. The seafarer, 40, had returned to the country last month and was quarantined according to norms. He had then entered Panchkula and was put in home quarantine till June 5. On testing negative, he was cleared for further isolation or quarantine.

He is a resident of Sector 2, Panchkula. As per health officials, he got himself tested at a private lab in Chandigarh. The results came out positive on Wednesday. Even though a case of Panchkula, he managed to get himself admitted to PGI which has otherwise refused to take in any cases other than Chandigarh’s.

As to how he contracted the virus, the authorities say either he contracted the virus as he mingled in the outside world after his isolation period was over or his test is a false negative. His samples have already been retaken by PGI.

Meanwhile, a 25-year-old staff nurse, working at the civil hospital of Panchkula, too has tested positive for novel coronavirus. “She had already been in home quarantine for the past 10 days,” said the Deputy Civil Surgeon, Dr Saroj Aggarwal.

The staff nurse is residing at Majri village of Panchkula and had treated her brother-in-law at her home who had come in from Kurukshetra and had later tested positive for the virus.

As many as 143 people have tested positive for the virus in Panchkula. Ninety-nine of those are residents of the district and are being counted in the district tally. The remaining 44 are outsiders who are seeking treatment in the district. There are 49 active cases.

Samples tested

The lab of Civil Hospital, Panchkula, which had remained shut for the past two days owing to some technical failure of a testing machine started working late Tuesday. Results of as many as 269 samples were declared on Wednesday, of which 268 tested negative while the staff nurse tested positive.

Only a single person testing positive in a huge batch of samples has provided Panchkula health authorities some sense of relief as compared to the previous days. More than 100 positive cases have been reported from the district in the past 12 days. Results of 149 samples are yet to come. A total of 8,513 samples have been collected so far.