The Spurthy college in Marasur, Bengaluru reported 12 nursing students as COVID positive on Friday, 26 November. This comes following the COVID outbreak in Karnataka’s Dharwad, which has been declared a COVID cluster, after the number of COVID cases spiked to 182, leaping from 66 a day before.
All the students who tested positive in Karnataka’s Marasur were in their first year of BSc. 11 out of them had taken both doses of vaccines while one wasn’t inoculated as she tested positive in June this year.
The college authorities have claimed that regular check-ups were being carried out and all necessary precautions were being taken. All the students and staff were being subjected to COVID tests fortnightly and actions have been taken to trace back all primary contacts and test them for COVID, including the remaining students.
M Kokila the principal of the nursing college said that they have been doing COVID testing continuously on their campus. There were seven rounds of COVID tests done for all students and staffs in the last two months, reported NDTV.
The source of infection has been traced to three students who had earlier gone to a supermarket in Anekal. They had developed symptoms but tested negative on RAT but before the results of RT-PCR came in they returned to their home towns, reported The Hindu.
The spike in the number of COVID cases is being reported as the Indian government is putting in place screening and testing for travellers coming from South Africa and 'at risk countries' following the identification and concerns over Omicron (new COVID variant).
Yesterday (Friday) on 26 November the Karnataka state government issued a directive to district administrations asking them to strictly follow the Test-Track-Treat-Vaccinate principle to contain and prevent the spread of COVID variants.
In a letter to states written by health secretary Rajesh Bhushan on Tuesday, 23 November, said, “This variant is reported to have a significantly high number of mutations, and thus, has serious public health implications for the country in view of recently relaxed visa restrictions and opening up of international travel.”
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