MP: 33 recent UK returnees asked to be in home isolation

Amid growing concerns over the detection of a new coronavirus strain in the UK, the Madhya Pradesh health department has asked 33 people who returned to Indore from that country in the last 15 days to remain in home isolation, an official said on Wednesday.
Indore district nodal officer for COVID-19 prevention, Amit Malakar, told PTI that health of these passengers was being closely monitored.
The list of these passengers was received from the state government, he said.
“These 33 people had returned from the UK in the last fortnight. They have been told to keep themselves isolated in their homes for 15 days after their arrival in Indore,” he said.
Malakar said, as per the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), samples of these 33 people were being tested by RT-PCR method.
Indore district was worst-hit by the COVID-19 pandemic in Madhya Pradesh.
As per official data, the Indore district reported 52,660 COVID-19 cases from March 24 to December 22. Of them, 847 patients have died.
As per the guidelines issued by the Union Health Ministry on Tuesday, passengers coming from the UK should undergo RT-PCR test and be isolated in a separate unit of an institutional facility if found positive.
India has suspended all passenger flights connecting the United Kingdom from Wednesday till December 31 or till further orders in the wake of the emergence of a mutated strain of the virus there.
According to the guidelines, state-wise passenger manifest of the flights from the UK landing at various airports in India for the past four weeks shall be conveyed by the Bureau of Immigration to the state government and Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP) so that the data would be provided to the surveillance teams for tracking.
It stated that all travellers from the UK will be required to declare, according to the existing procedure, their travel history of past 14 days and fill up the self- declaration form to be screened for COVID-19.
All passengers coming from the UK from December 21 to 23 would be subjected to the RT-PCR test on arrival and this has to be ensured by respective state governments, the SOP stated.