Shillong Civil Hospital OPD closed after doctor tests COVID-19 positive

Shillong: The OPD of Civil Hospital in Shillong has been closed after a senior doctor tested positive for COVID-19 on Wednesday. The senior anaesthesiologist contracted the virus while attending to a critically-ill COVID-19 patient in the hospital, as per reports.

While the hospital has been able to carry out the contact tracing, since the doctor had a very limited movement, the government on Friday decided to close the OPD as a precautionary measure. Emergency services, however, will remain open.

In a statement issued by the health and family welfare department, it stated that all the high-risk contacts of the doctor are from the COVID unit and will follow a rigorous protocol where they will be tested every seven days and quarantined as per the state government protocol.

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As a matter of extra caution, the tests are also being done for all secondary contacts and other staff of the hospital. Samples have also been collected from them for the RT-PCR test. Reports of the antigen test of 330 samples of both high-risk and low-risk contacts have been declared negative. While the antigen test of the 16 high risk contacts is negative, they are being quarantined separately and their samples have already been taken for RT-PCR test.

The government has also informed that the sampling of returnees and other external contacts will not be conducted at Civil Hospital.

Meanwhile, the critical COVID-19 patient, who was admitted at Civil Hospital, was later transferred to NEIGRIHMS but succumbed to the virus late on Thursday evening.

According to reports, the deceased patient was a woman in her mid 60s.

The state’s total death toll has now risen to five, while the total positive cases in the state now stand at 559.