The district administrations are on high alert after 13 students of a government-run residential hostel in Hassan and seven medical college students, including an internee, tested positive for COVID-19, the health department officials said on Tuesday. Following the detection of positive cases at the Morarji Desai hostel of Guramaranahalli village in Channarayapatna taluk of Hassan and Chamarajanagar Medical Sciences Institute have been sealed off by the authorities.
All infected students of the hostel have been shifted to a COVID Care Centre. All are asymptomatic and recovering well according to the health department. It has been decided to conduct tests on primary contacts of the infected students. The infections were found in the routine RT-PCR tests conducted by the Health Department every 15 days. The hostel students affected with COVID-19 are studying in Class 6-10. All of them have been isolated and are being treated.
The COVID tests were conducted on 325 students of the Chamarajanagar Medical Sciences Institute, of which seven tested positive. About 500 primary contacts of the students and staff were tested and their results are negative. The tests were conducted on further 150 students and their test results are awaited. The district administrations have initiated strict monitoring of the situation and are trying to contain the infection within the clusters. Fortunately, the disease has not spread to residential localities.
Recently, more than 280 persons were tested positive for COVID in Dharwad's SDM Medical College. The infections were also reported from the Bengaluru International Boarding school. However, the authorities have successfully handled the situation and the infection has not spread so far.