Delhi woman visiting Baddi shows Covid symptoms; dies at Chandigarh PGI

Tribune News Service
Solan, April 3 

A 70-year-old-woman from Delhi, who was staying in a guest house with her husband in Himachal Pradesh's Solan district, has died due to COVID-19, a senior official said on Friday.

The woman's case was earlier unreported, Solan Deputy Commissioner KC Chaman told PTI.

She was referred to Chandigarh from Brooklyn Lifeline hospital at Jharmajri in Baddi on Thursday.

The woman and her 76-year-old husband, who is director at a factory in Baddi, had come here on March 14 along with their five relatives by a private vehicle, Baddi Superintendent of Police Rohit Malpani said.

On March 31, the woman visited the private hospital in Baddi with high fever. She was prescribed medicines and and advised home quarantine, he said.

When she did not get relief, she again visited the hospital on Thursday and was then referred to PGIMER in Chandigarh, where she breathed her last in the night.

Panic has gripped the Baddi administration as it is scrambling to contain the hospital as well as the company premises.

Police have traced 45 contacts of the woman. They include her husband and five relatives who accompanied her from Delhi and 33 factory employees, the SP said.

Besides, five residents of Hill View Society who visited the hospital on the days when the woman came there have been home quarantined. The private hospital’s nurse has also been quarantined in the hospital itself, the SP added.                 

Another elderly couple associated with the factory in Baddi has been home quarantined after they complained of high fever on March 30, he said.

With this, the number of COVID-19 positive cases in the hill state has risen to seven.

This is the second death in Himachal Pradesh due to COVID-19.

Earlier, a 69-year-old man who recently returned from the USA died of COVID-19 at the Dr Rajendra Prasad Government Medical College (RPGMC) in Kangra district on March 23. On March 20, two persons—a 32-year-old man from Harchakkian tehsil and a 64-year-old woman from Dohabe village in Shahpur subdivision—were tested positive for the disease.

The man was discharged from hospital after recovery whereas the woman is being treated at the Dr Rajendra Prasad Government Medical College (RPGMC) in the district.

On April 2, three people who attended the Tablighi Jamaat’s congregation in New Delhi last month and came to Himachal Pradesh tested positive for coronavirus. with PTI