KARACHI / ISLAMABAD: While one more patient of novel coronavirus has been found in Sindh, taking the number of cases tofourin the province and seven in the country, the National Institute of Health (NIH) is content that the country has avoided a major outbreak of the deadly disease as 16 days have passed to closure of Pak-Iran border.

The new patient belongs to Karachi. One of the seven patients has been discharged from hospital af ter recovery.

This was disclosed on Sunday in a meeting of the Task Force on Coronavirus held at the CM House in Karachi and chaired by Sindh Chief Minister Syed MuradAli Shah.

The meeting was attended by Minister for Health Dr Azra Pechuho, Minister for Local Government Nasir Shah, Chief Secretary Mumtaz Shah, Inspector General of police Mushtaq Mahar, health secretary Zahid Abbasi, Provincial DisasterManagement Authority director general Salman Shah, Dr Faisal of Aga Khan, representatives of the Civil Aviation Authority, Corps 5, Rangers and World Health Organisation and others.

The health secretary told the meeting that the samples of four suspected patients were recently sent for lab test; of them one was diagnosed as positive while the rest were declared negative.The chief minister directed the health department to isolate the suspects, their family members and others who had remained in contact with them.

The meeting was informed that the health department had conducted the test of a total of 107 samples, of them four were diagnosed as positive and 103 negative.

It was informed that one of the affected persons had recovered and had been released from hospital on Saturday while at present 265 persons were quarantined at their homes.

The meeting was told that 300 pilgrims coming from Iran, who were scheduled to reach Sukkur on Sunday, could not leave the border town of Taftan and now they would leave for Sukkur on Monday evening.

The chief minister directed the commissioner of Sukkur to ensure that the pilgrims were checked when they reached Sukkur. He said that if all pilgrims were declared clear they should be allowed to go to home but if any of them had symptoms of coronavirus allthe passengers of the bus should be keptin quarantine.

The commissioner said that they had developed a capacity of keeping 1,024 pilgrims in quarantine in Sukkur. He said that all the facilities, from electricity, water, sanitation, bedding, food and clothing to regular medical checkups, testing and screening and counselling had been made available at the facility.

The chief minister directed the commissioner to establish a control room where presence of representatives of revenue, buildings, public health and health departments, the municipal corporation and Sepco should be ensured.

Mr Shah was told that 30 male medical of ficers, 18 women medical officers, two gynaecologists, three senior women medical officers and paramedical and janitorial staff had been deputed at the facility and all were present on their duty.

The Sindh police chief said that he had posted 216 police personnelatthefacility.

The chief minister directed the commissioner of Sukkur to arrange eight ambulances to be kept at the facility and a standby generator should also be made available there.

The commissioner said that a 27-bed isolation ward had been established at the Jacobabad Institute of Medical Sciences.

The chief minister approved Rs30 million for the Sukkur quarantine facility and vowed to provide more funds, if and when required.

Meanwhile, authorities in Islamabad are satisfied that the country has avoided a major outbreak of coronavirus.

`Unfortunately around 7,000 people crossed the PakIran border without being kept in quarantine as our major focus was on China and we were not aware that the virus had reached Iran,` Executive Director of the National Institute of Health, Islamabad, Maj Gen Dr Aamir Ilcram told Dawn. `We feared that a large number of pilgrims who had returned from Iran could be infected with the virus. However as the incubation period of the virus is around two weeks, we can surely say that no other pilgrim, who has crossed border over two weeks ago, has been infected.

He said that samples of nine persons, who had remained in contact with the latest confirmed case, had been collected to check whether they were also infected with the virus or not.

`One patient in Pakistan has been recovered from disease and all others are in stable condition,` Dr Ikram said.

The outbreak of COVID-19, the disease caused by coronavirus, was first reported from Wuhan, China, on Dec 31, 2019 and later spread to other countries. The deadly virus has reached 105 countries with 107,936 confirmed cases.

Though 3,665 deaths have been reported but 16 times more patients i.e. 60,924 have recovered from the disease.