In a worrying development, an IAS officer of Madhya Pradesh who is posted as a senior official with the health department was confirmed as having coronavirus (COVID-19) on Friday.
After the officer’s second sample test conducted at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), Bhopal, came positive, Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan is said to have quarantined himself at his home. Though this was not officially confirmed, Chouhan did not go to his office in the state secretariat and conducted all work from home, including a videoconference with religious leaders, sources said.
The IAS officer was present at a videoconference conducted by the chief minister at the secretariat on March 31, where other senior officials of the health and other departments were also present. The officer developed high fever and cold on April 1, following which his sample was sent for testing. The first sample was reported to be positive on Thursday, but the state government did not confirm this.
On Friday night, the principal secretary of the health department, Pallavi Jain Govil, issued a video health bulletin, in which she confirmed that the IAS officer, without naming him, had tested positive for coronavirus. Earlier in the day, to a query by THE WEEK, Govil had said that the confirmatory test report of the officer was still awaited.
The principal secretary said that the health of the officer was stable and his fever had gone, but he would remain hospitalised for another two days and will be discharged only after the doctors give him a go-ahead.
The chief minister is also said to have directed all officers in Mantralaya from home. Several officials of health department who had been participating in meetings with the affected officer are said to have shifted to hotels and government guesthouses to quarantine themselves.
154 cases in MP; Indore tally climbs to 112
Meanwhile, the number of COVID-19 cases is surging in the state. With 23 more testing positive in Indore on Friday night and 10 in Morena district, the tally has gone up to 154 in the state. The death toll, fortunately, remained at eight. Of the positive cases, 112 are from Indore.
The 10 patients found positive in Morena are related to a couple who had returned from Dubai last week and were detected to be positive on Thursday. Thus the total figure in Morena stood at 12.
Bhopal has total eight cases—four of them of persons who had attended the Tablighi Jamaat congregation in Nizamuddin in Delhi. The tests of two initial patients—a journalist and his daughter—are said to have come negative now as they have recovered and they might be soon discharged from AIIMS soon, sources said.
Eight cases each have been reported from Jabalpur and Ujjain, two each from Gwalior and Shivpuri and one each from Chhindwara and Khargone.
The principal secretary of health department, however, confirmed only 127 positive cases in the health bulletin, but it was issued before the Indore cases were reported.
