and A group of Irish people who are being evacuated from the Chinese city at the centre of the coronavirus outbreak will have to spend two weeks in quarantine in a UK hospital. The rescue flight with three Irish nationals, who were stranded in Wuhan for a week, is part of an airlift for around 150 Britons.
A number of other Irish in Wuhan have opted to stay and declined the offer of a seat on the plane which is due in the UK today.It is understood that returning passengers will be put on buses which will take them to empty staff accommodation at Arrowe Park Hospital, in Wirral, Merseyside, where they will stay for two weeks.
The 900-bed flagship hospital is situated in the Wirral peninsula.
Log In
New to Independent.ie? Create an account
A pool table has been installed and access to the internet has been arranged to provide entertainment for the passengers, none of whom would have been allowed leave Wuhan if they did not pass a medical exam indicating they were clear of the virus.
It comes amid tightened checks here by the HSE to keep Ireland free of the spread of the virus which has killed 170 and infected over 7,700.
Health officials said a number of suspected cases were examined here in the past week but they were given the all clear and none was in need of more testing.
Earlier yesterday Dr Sam McConkey, an infectious disease consultant in Beaumont Hospital, said there was the potential for 20,000 cases of the virus here.
He warned: «It hasn’t yet been detected in Ireland but it is quite possible that over the next three, four, six or eight weeks, that we might be seeing thousands of people coming to emergency rooms with that virus.
»Effort
Asked about the forecast, Dr Kevin Kelleher, head of health protection in the HSE, said there was a strong action plan in place to detect a case and prevent its spread.
«We are putting a massive amount of effort into dealing with any really quite low degree of possibility of a case to ensure that we don’t miss anything.»
If a case was detected, the contacts of the infected patient would be traced and tested. The measures are being overseen by a HSE multi-disciplinary team. Dr Cillian de Gascun, head of the Virus Reference Laboratory in UCD, said it will be able to test for the virus from Monday and provide a same-day result.
Ireland has been deemed at «moderate» risk of a coronavirus case.
Risk factors include anyone who has been in Wuhan and developed symptoms such as fever, shortness of breath or cough within two weeks of return.
Dr John Cuddihy, director of the Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC), advised any members of the public who have developed symptoms after being in Wuhan to ring their GP.
«If somebody has travelled to Wuhan in the Hubei province and you become unwell, especially with respiratory symptoms, temperature, cough, breathing difficulties, within 14 days of returning, then we’re emphasising that person should phone their GP and mention relevant concerns,» Dr Cuddihy said.
Свежие комментарии