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Several European cases of coronavirus traced to ski resort in the Alps

pharmafile | February 10, 2020 | News story | Sales and Marketing china coronavirus, coronavirus, vietnam coronavrisu, wuhan cornavirus 

Multiple European cases of coronavirus have been traced to a ski resort in the Alps, with a British man spread the disease to several others he came into contact with.

The French health ministry said that five British nationals who came into contact with the man tested positive in the Alps resort of Contamines-Montjoie. He had flown from Singapore and stayed in the area before returning to England on 28 January, on a flight from Geneva to Gatwick. However, since the man was not displaying any symptoms it is unlikely he transmitted the disease to others on the flight, but it is still possible.

This man has also been linked to cases in Span and France. Paul Hunter, professor in medicine at University of East Anglia, said: “Whilst we currently do not know many details about how this new case was linked to others in the cluster, his/her identification does not at this stage indicate wider spread within the UK community. If the new individual had been already identified through contact tracing and the person was self-isolating then this should not pose any additional risk.

“Further cases within an already identified cluster are not surprising and do not pose an additional risk to public health providing such contacts are complying with instructions from Public Health England.”

Today, the UK government also announced tougher powers to keep people in quarantine to stop the spread of the coronavirus. This is due to an order by the Department of Health that has described the virus as a “serious and imminent threat” to public health.

There have been 40,000 cases of the virus around the world with 910 people dying.

Conor Kavanagh

 

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