The number of Covid-19 cases at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras stands at 171 as of now with 26 more cases reported today, April 28 at the campus. Classes have gone online. The government collected 1000 more samples on Thursday, with an overall test positive rate of 2.5 per cent. A total of 6000 people have been tested so far.
Even as concerns of a surge in cases emerged over the last week, an outbreak of fresh cases at the premier technology institute was a cause for concern. The institute which has turned out to be a cluster recently is expected to taper off in the coming days on continued identification and isolation of fresh patients, state health secretary J Radhakrishnan told CNN News18.
The state health secretary said that the cluster control involves going beyond testing primary contacts and isolating them, and involves tracking tertiary contacts too. “The test positivity rate is coming down, from levels as high as 4 per cent,” the official said.
Radhakrishnan said the government is isolating patients within the facility. The government is deploying a range of containment strategies to ensure probable contacts of infected patients do not pass it on to others.
Incidentally, IIT Madras was a cluster in the previous waves of the Coronavirus. The state government is hoping with increased containment and higher testing, the cluster at IIT Madras would soon be brought under control. The institute is a statement earlier this week said it is ready to face up to the challenge.
It said it has experience in containing the pandemic through waves starting March 2020. This comes amid the institute’s researchers releasing a report stating Covid-19 patients with mild or moderate conditions can be treated with Indomethacin.
Initially, the institute had reported three Covid positive cases on the campus following which more samples were collected of students with mild symptoms. Thereafter, the toll rose to 12. As of Tuesday, April 26, the Covid tally at the IIT Madras campus reached 111. Later, after 33 more tested positive on campus, the total number of cases rose to 145 within a day.
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