“On Friday, three individuals who arrived from Singapore and the United Kingdom tested COVID-19 positive, including a child. This morning, a 25-year-old man arrived from the UK via Dubai and tested positive”, the Minister for Medical and Family Welfare said.

The Minister was talking to reporters in Villupuram after inspecting the 13th edition of mega vaccination camp on Saturday. “This 25-year-old man has been admitted to the King Institute of Preventive Medicine and Research Hospital at Guindy. With this, four people have tested positive on arrival from high-risk countries,” he said.

Inspecting a similar vaccination camp in Tindivanam later, Subramanian said a passenger who arrived from Singapore to Madurai after giving RT-PCR sample for testing was supposed to wait at the ‘holding area’. “But he escaped and later his RT-PCR sampling tested COVID-19 positive. The passenger was traced and now he has been admitted to a hospital in Nagercoil. Through you (media), we appeal to passengers arriving from such high-risk countries to extend their support to the health department instead of posing a risk by spreading the contagion to others,” he said. Subramanian said the passengers who were being treated at the hospital were doing well and suspected to have contracted the Delta variant of the virus. “We have sent their samples to the Institute for Stem Cell Science and Regenerative Medicine, Bengaluru, (INSTEM) for genomic sequencing,” he pointed out.