Dozen from Sikkim in same flight as Kalimpong victim

10 tracked down, search on to trace other two

PANKAJ DHUNGEL
GANGTOK: Sikkim Health department have tracked down 10 persons from Sikkim who were in the same flight as the unfortunate lady from Kalimpong who got infected with COVID-19 and passed away today morning at Siliguri. Search is on for the two remaining passengers from Sikkim.
A total of 320 passengers were on board the SpiceJet flight of March 19 from Chennai to Bagdogra including the lady from Kalimpong. Among them, 12 passengers were from Sikkim – seven from east district and five from west district.
“With aid from Ministry of Civil Aviation, we have tracked down 10 passengers from Sikkim and six of them were already in home quarantine. Tracking is on for the two remaining passengers of Sikkim. All the ten persons are under quarantine in their respective districts. Four of them in Rangpo didn’t fill the self-declaration form and we didn’t know, they were tracked yesterday and shifted to the quarantine centre", stated Health director general Dr. Pempa Tshering Bhutia to SIKKIM EXPRESS on Monday morning.
People here are concerned that whether the 12 passengers from Sikkim came in close contact with the Kalimpong victim during the flight.
On this, Dr. Bhutia said: “The victim was placed at 1A with the closest placed Sikkim passenger to the victim was placed at 12A, another in 14th row while the rest were mostly placed at 26th and 27th row. The two metre distance has been maintained with regards to placement.”
The Health director general asserted that if there was a symptom to be noted among the Sikkimese passengers, it should have emerged by now highlighting how 11 days have passed since their travel.
“Since they came in the same flight, we might conduct sampling for all the 12 identified persons and send the samples to either NBMCH testing lab if it is functional, if not to Kolkata by tomorrow,” said Dr. Bhutia.
Withholding travel history is a grave crime in the current scenario and emphasizing on the same, the Health director general appealed everyone who have commuted to Sikkim over the last two weeks from outside the State, to voluntarily disclose their travel history. “Thankfully, the public in the State are very conscious about the situation and it has been neighbours and others who have informed the SDMs and Police, if a person has been hiding their travel history. A few cases came to light and they have been reprimanded and put under home and government quarantine facilities,” he said.
Meanwhile, 10 samples have been sent by the State so far, with three being sent on Sunday with 8 being negative and two awaiting results still. “A written report upon receiving is a valid proof, but there are cases of repeat sample hence verbal assurance is not right. We waited for authentication and all have come negative so far. We need to avoid indiscriminate testing as sampling is an expensive procedure currently,” said Dr. Bhutia.