2 teachers & 7 students infected, KR Puram school sealed
8 residents of Chikkalasandra apartment test positive
BENGALURU:
Heightening fears of a second Covid-19 wave in Karnataka, two more clusters have been reported in Bengaluru city, comprising a total of 17 positive cases of which 7 are school students. The infections among the students has compelled the authorities to shut down the government high school in KR Puram for the next 14 days.
With the two new clusters, the state capital has witnessed a total of 8 clusters in the last one month, the first being the SNN Lake View apartment in Bommanahalli zone near Bilekahalli.
BBMP Commissioner N Manjunatha Prasad confirmed the cluster at the school at Narayanapura — a government high school in BBMP’s ward No 55 of Devasandra in KR Puram — where 7 students tested positive after two teachers were reported to have come in contact with the coronavirus.
6 students in hospital
As per Prasad, on February 27, two teachers had tested positive. On subsequent testing of 160 students on March 4, seven tested positive and six of them were shifted to KR Puram General Hospital as their home isolation conditions were not satisfactory.
The school has a student strength of 188, of whom 160 have been tested and 28 are yet to be tested. The administration has shut the school for the next 14 days and the school has been declared a ‘Covid cluster’.
All apartment residents tested
Meanwhile, a multi-dwelling unit in Chikkalasandra – five-storeyed Sai Kuteera – has witnessed 8 positive cases.
Sources said that a couple has been admitted in a private hospital and their two sons, 17 and 13 years old respectively, who also turned positive are under home isolation.
As per officials, the husband was the first to get infected. It is reported that he returned from Hyderabad recently and subsequently all 108 residents of Sai Kuteera attended a wedding anniversary function on February 21 on the first floor of the building. But it is yet to be ascertained whether the infection came from Hyderabad or somebody else who attended the wedding anniversary function was a carrier.
After displaying symptoms of a fever, the returnee from Hyderabad tested positive on February 25. Later, his wife and two sons also tested positive.
Subsequently, BBMP conducted tests on all 108 residents of Sai Kuteera on February 26 and 27, out of which 2 turned positive. Then, 7 days later on March 3, 60 were tested out of which 2 positive cases were reported.
On Friday, 60 residents were tested again, and a total of 8 positive cases were found.
The BBMP Commissioner said all the floors of the apartment have been sanitized.
