70 students, faculty members test positive for COVID-19 in Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad

The number of COVID-19 cases in the Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA) has gone up to 70, civic officials said on Tuesday. On Sunday, the premier B-school had said 45 of its students, faculty and staff members tested positive for the viral infection over the last two weeks.

"There are 70 positive cases in the IIMA now," Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation's deputy health officer Mehul Acharya said. These people were found positive in the RT-PCR tests conducted by the institute on its campus, he said. "They have formed a quarantine centre and all COVID-19 patients are kept in the separate facility. Their doctors and our teams are regularly monitoring the health of those who are found positive," Acharya said.

As per the COVID-19 dashboard of the IIMA, out of the 70 people who have tested positive, 59 are in quarantine. It further says that 43 students, one faculty and 15 staff members are in quarantine. The COVID-19 cases started rising in the IIMA from the second week of March when a student tested positive on the campus after a gap of nearly a month. Within ten days, ten more people tested positive, and the number went up to 46 by last week, it said.

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Over the last couple of days, the number reached 70. In the last 210 days, the institute conducted 3,917 tests, both the rapid antigen and RT-PCR, for the detection of coronavirus. Most of the people who have tested positive at the IIMA are asymptomatic, a senior official said. Visits to the campus are restricted and those coming to stay with the students or faculty from outside are required to submit a self-declaration form and stay quarantined for a stipulated time, officials said. Ahmedabad city is also seeing a huge surge in coronavirus cases. It reported 602 new infections on Monday, as per the state government's health bulletin.