An ambulance driver, who drove a patient from Chennai to Tripura, was tested positive for COVID-19. The driver was on his way back to Tamil Nadu and was near Alipurduar in West Bengal, when his test results came in.
Reports said that the driver, who was admitted to a COVID-19 hospital in Siliguri, was asymptomatic. His companion driver of the same vehicle was found negative. He has been placed in institutional quarantine.
Two families of South Tripura had hired the ambulance from Chennai to return home who had gone of treatment last month. The ambulance dropped three passengers in Udaipur of Gomati district and two in Shantirbazar of South Tripura on April 27. The vehicle had returned the next day and drivers spent a night at a hotel somewhere outside Agartala.
As per the protocol, health team collected sample from all five passengers and two drivers on April 28 morning and the test report came on April 29 night which indicated six of them were negative and a driver got infested with the virus.
The state health officials immediately contacted with their West Bengal counterpart and traced the ambulance on national highway at Alipurduar. Immediately, the driver was shifted to a COVID-19 hospital in Siliguri and his companion was put into institutional quarantine there.
The Tripura government has taken all five passengers into institutional quarantine although they were found negative in first test.
“We shall collect their swab again today to reconfirm the test. The staff and other people, including a few policemen were taken to quarantine, who had come in contact of the infected driver. There is no point of concern for Tripura as of now because the person left the state and all the passengers were tested negative,” officials stated.
