HYDERABAD: A 54-year-old man, who was under treatment for paralysis at a private hospital and later tested positive for coronavirus at the Liaquat University Hospital’s city branch, died at the hospital’s isolation ward on Friday night, the first death from the virus in the city.

The patient who also suffered from hypertension was brought to the LUH’s intensive care unit last night from a private hospital in Latifabad Unit-6 where he was under treatment for paralysis.

At the LUH, among other tests the patient’s sample was taken for coronavirus which turned out to be positive and he was immediately shifted to the isolation ward. He was put on ventilator but could not survive, according to medical superintendent Dr Mazhar Kalhoro.

Police and health authorities rushed to the private hospital after the detection of virus in the patient and closed it down for a few hours for fumigation. Two more patients were said to be in critical condition at the isolation ward but the MS was optimistic they would recover as both were young in mid 20s.

Currently, 15 coronavirus patients are admitted to the LUH’s isolation ward and 82 in Kohsar quarantine facility.

Two gynaecologists at LUH also tested positive for the virus but they had not been admitted to the isolation ward, said sources.

Out of 82 samples, three tested positive and 79 negative after analysis at Diagnostic and Research Laboratory on Friday. Two of the samples belonged to Tableeghi Jamaat members who were quarantined in Sehwan and the other was a female resident of Memon Society Hyderabad.

LARKANA: Two more persons tested positive for coronavirus on Friday, raising the total positive cases of the district to nine, said Dr Athar Shah, district health officer and in-charge of quarantine centre at the Arija campus of Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto Medical University.

The two were among the 36 suspected patients at the centre whose samples were collected on Wednesday by a team of doctors from Gambat Institute of Medical Sciences (GIMS), he said.

BADIN: A 35-year-old man became the first coronavirus patient of Badin district and two more individuals tested positive for the virus in Larkana on Friday.

Published in Dawn, April 4th, 2020