A 20-year old man who travelled by train from Delhi to the city tested positive for coronavirus on Wednesday, becoming Tamil Nadus second COVID-19 patient, over ten days after the first case surfaced in the state, Health Minister C Vijaya Baskar said.
Incidentally, the first patient, a 45-year old engineer, has been discharged from hospital after his recovery, the Minister announced.
On the latest case, he indicated the patient did not have any history of foreign travel, describing him as a domestic case.
The youth, hailing from Delhi was currently in the isolation ward at the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital (RGGGH) here and being monitored closely, he said adding efforts would be launched immediately to trace those whom he had come into contact in recent days.
He is a 20-year-old hailing from New Delhi While coming to Chennai he was not showing any symptoms. But, yesterday he visited the RGGGH with symptoms of coronavirus and we collected his samples.
"A few hours ago, I received message from the Dean (of the hospital) that he has tested positive for the virus. Now we will be tracking the epidemiology link, Vijaya Baskar told reporters on Wednesday evening.
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The Minister, however, declined to entertain questions on when the patient arrived here and about his travel history.
"All I can say is the first positive case was imported since that patient had visited Oman. This is a domestic case. He has come to Tamil Nadu through train", he said.
The Minister said the patient initially did not show any symptoms upon his arrival from New Delhi but later he developed symptoms of coronavirus. "We will trace his contacts immediately."
Earlier, in a social media post, he said: "Chennai reports the second positive case for #Covid19. The patient hails from New Delhi, is in isolation and stable under the observation of the expert team treating #Covid19."