Second Covid-19 patient 'is doing extremely well'
A PERSON arriving from France has been confirmed as being the second positive case of Covid-19 in the island.
But there is still no evidence that the illness is spreading in the community. Public Health director Dr Nicola Brink confirmed that the results came in this afternoon [Friday]. The person had returned from France 10 days ago.
‘I’m pleased to report the person is doing extremely well,’ she said.
‘I’m also very pleased to report that we were able to identify the case very quickly. The case went into self-isolation. They have had minimum contacts.’
The patient is currently getting better at home. ‘We support people while they are being managed at home, with daily safe and well phone calls and so on,’ Dr Brink said.
‘And we try and make them feel that we are involved with them.’
If they need to be admitted to hospital, they will be.
Dr Brink said France had already been identified as an area of interest when it came to Covid-19 and this had highlighted the importance of looking at what was happening outside the island. There have been more than 10,000 cases of the illness in France and more than 300 deaths.
No details about how the person came to island have been revealed, although it was confirmed they had been on holiday there. Condor is the main way to travel to France, with sailings between the islands and St Malo, but these will be halted from Monday until 2 April.
Dr Brink said the latest case had been picked up in a timely manner.
‘We are busy contact tracing,’ she said.
She said the work should be completed within a few hours last night.
‘What I would like to emphasis is that this is a case that came from France to us, so still is evidence of an imported case, so to date we have no evidence of ongoing community transmission within our community,’ she said.
Those people the patient had been in contact with will be given quarantine information.
More than 80% of cases of the virus are mild.
