2 On UK Flights Test Positive, Flee Delhi, Traced To Andhra, Punjab

Two passengers on UK flights who tested positive on arrival in Delhi this week left isolation centres and reached their hometowns in Andhra Pradesh and Punjab. They have been tracked down and admitted in government facilities amid worries about a fast-spreading mutant strain of the coronavirus found in the UK.

A 47-year-old woman arrived on Monday and tested positive for Covid in a Rapid Antigen Test at the Delhi airport. Her 22-year-old son tested negative. Passengers on UK flights are being tested at airports across the country to check the spread of a fast-spreading mutant variant of the coronavirus that has emerged in Britain.

The woman was taken to the Safdarjung hospital and reportedly advised home isolation as she was asymptomatic. She then travelled with her son from Delhi to Rajahmundry by the AP Special Express, which arrived at midnight yesterday.

Railway police and health officials took her straight from the railway station to the hospital.

“We have carried out rapid antigen and RT-PCR tests for the mother and son. We have also sent samples to the National Institute of Virology at Pune for genome sequencing,” district medical and health officer KVS Gowrishwara Rao told NDTV. The son has once again tested negative for the virus and both are asymptomatic, he said.

The woman, a teacher in the UK, allegedly told officials that she left on her own as she was asymptomatic.

The Andhra Pradesh government said the woman travelled first class and did not interact with anyone on the train.