All 4 Nipah patients including 9-yr-old boy have recovered, says Kerala Health Minister

Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala) [India]: Kerala Health Minister Veena George on Friday said that all four patients including a nine-year-old who were undergoing treatment for Nipah have recovered and have tested negative for the virus infection.

A total of six cases of Nipah virus infection were reported in Kerala’s Kozhikode district of which two persons died.

The Health Minister today said that all four patients have tested double negative and left hospital.

“Informing the good news that four people, including a nine-year-old boy who were undergoing treatment for Nipah, have recovered from the infection and have tested double negative (two samples tested in intervals tested negative),” the Health Minister said in a post in Malayalam on Facebook.

The nine-year-old boy is the son of Muhammad Ali (47), the index case, who died due to the deadly virus on August 30. The second victim died on September 11.

As per the government data, no new Nipah cases were reported until Sunday and the five samples that were sent for lab tests have tested negative.

The Kozhikode District Administration has relaxed restrictions in containment zones in the district as no new cases were reported.

Earlier in a press briefing, Minister Veena George said that the state government has decided to strengthen the healthcare system.

“We have started to strengthen the ‘One Health’ activities in the district. We have started training people for the same. ‘One health’ means all the departments will come together.

We have also taken the decision to establish an institution where all the departments will be well-coordinated. So, community surveillance will be there throughout the year”, she said.

The health minister said that ICMR and WHO had conducted studies and found that Kerala and eight other states in India have the probability of Nipah occurrence.

Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has said that the state will conduct a seroprevalence study on the Nipah virus being repeatedly found in Kozhikode district.