A 38-year-old youth, Raju Vishwakarma, a resident of Mira Road, was quarantined at Kasturba hospital on Sunday after he returned from South Korea.
Senior health officials have collected his blood sample and sent it to the National Institute of Virology (NIV) for testing.
Although he did not show any symptoms of coronavirus, he has been kept in an isolation ward as a precautionary measure.
The call was taken in the wake of a State health department circular stating that travellers coming from Wuhan should be quarantined immediately for precautionary measures. “Vishwakarma was in South Korea from February 2 to February 29 and while undergoing thermal screening at Mumbai International Airport he was seen to be running fever and having a cold, owing to which he has been isolated,” said doctors.
The state has not recorded any case of coronavirus infection so far, health minister Rajesh Tope said in a statement.
A total of 59,654 passengers have been screened at the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Mumbai International Airport for possible exposure to the coronavirus (Covid-19) since January 18.
Passengers arriving from China, Hong Kong, Thailand, Singapore, South Korea, Japan, Nepal, Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia, Iran and Italy are being screened, he said.
Shankar Raj adds from Kochi: Kerala went through a COVID scare as a 36-year-old patient from Kannur died on the intervening night of Friday and Saturday. The patient was admitted with Covid-19-like symptoms at the Government Medical College.
An alert Kerala government had sent his samples to the National Institute of Virology, Alappuzha and Pune. Both the reports were negative. However, the state went into a high alert.
The deceased was working in a supermarket in Malaysia and had arrived at Cochin International Airport late on Thursday night. Reports said he could not even stand erect and was coughing. He was immediately rushed to the isolation ward of the medical college at around 1am on Friday and put on ventilator support.
Hospital sources said he had pneumonia, but what complicated matters was that he also suffered from diabetic ketoacidosis, a life-threatening problem generally faced by people with diabetes. Hospital sources cited acute pneumonia and respiratory failure as the cause of death.
Meanwhile, 20 fishermen from Kerala are stranded in COVID-hit Iran. According to an SOS sent to the Kerala government, they have no food or water and have been left to fend for themselves.
The Kerala government has sent and urgent letter to the External Affairs Ministry to bring back the fishermen.
