Hetauda, May 23

Hetauda Hospital has decided to keep 22 health workers and staffers, including its medical superintendent, in isolation for a week after a woman referred from the hospital to Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital, Maharajgunj for treatment tested positive for COVID-19.

The woman was referred to TUTH Maharajgunj on May 17.

After she was diagnosed with novel coronavirus, it was decided that 22 staffers and nurses, including five doctors, would be kept in isolation for a week.

An emergency meeting at the hospital decided to this effect.

Five doctors and 17 staffers and health workers who came in contact with the woman would be kept in isolation, said Hetauda Hospital Corona Unit Chief Hari Bahadur Khadka.

The Ministry of Health and Population had confirmed the virus in the woman aged 54 yesterday. “Doctors and health workers, who attended to the woman, will be kept in isolation”, said Khadka.

Out of 150 employees at the hospital, throat swab samples of 66 have been collected and sent for lab test.

Meanwhile, Chitwan DAO has started contact tracing of nurses, doctors and other people who came in contact with the woman. “Preparation is under way to collect swab samples of doctors and health workers’ families and people they came in contact with,” said Khadka.

A version of this article appears in e-paper on May 24, 2020, of The Himalayan Times.