IEDCR to research on the virus strain

A specialist team of Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research (IEDRC) will be collecting samples for further research to understand the strain of Covid-19 that UK returnees are affected with.

On Monday night, 28 UK returnees were tested positive for coronavirus while they were staying in mandatory quarantine at different hotels.

Earlier, another one was tested positive. With him, all 29 UK returnees are admitted at the Khadimnagar 31-bed Hospital, a dedicated isolation and treatment centre for Covid-19.

Dr Anisur Rahman, assistant director (disease control) of Sylhet divisional health office, said, "The UK returnees' samples were collected as per the rules before releasing them from quarantine. After they were tested positive in the Shimantik laboratory, we've sent them to isolation centre."

"The IEDCR team will be collecting their samples to understand which strain of covid-19 they are infected with," he said.

A total of 157 UK returnees landed at Sylhet Osmani International Airport on January 21 on a Biman Bangladesh Airlines' flight.

As per the instruction of the Ministry of Health, they were taken into four-day mandatory institutional quarantine at different hotels.

Upon completion of their quarantine, their samples were sent to Covid-19 PCR lab on Sunday and 28 of them tested positive for coronavirus on Monday night.

As a new strain of coronavirus was spreading in UK, Bangladesh imposed mandatory institutional quarantine for UK returnees starting January 1. Since then, a total of 544 UK returnees landed in Sylhet Airport till Monday. Among them 372 returnees were sent home after they tested negative while 143 passengers are staying in quarantine at different hotels.