Two more cases of Covid-19 confirmed in Male' City, total 5

Health Protection Agency (HPA) has confirmed that two more cases have been tested positive for Covid-19 in the capital Male' City.

In a tweet on its official account, HPA stated that the test results of two individuals in direct contact with Patient 23, the third confirmed case of Covid-19 in Male' City had also tested positive for the virus.

The news, means that a total of five people have been tested positive for the virus from Male' City.

HPA also added that the two individuals were in quarantine after being in direct contact with Patient 23 before testing positive and are now being moved to an isolation facility.

The Health Protection Agency has previously requested the public to provide any information regarding the first three positive cases in the populous capital confirmed on Wednesday. Authorities are still conducting contact tracing on Patient 21, which is the first confirmed case from the capital. Patient 22, the next confirmed case in the capital was later identified as the child of Patient 21. The third case, Patient 23, who was in contact with Patient 21, has also tested positive for the virus. 

Male' City is already under a state of lockdown following the three confirmed cases on Wednesday. The state of lockdown in Male' is set to expire at 15:30 tomorrow. The government has also suspended travel between all islands across the country from 18:00 tomorrow, as a safety measure against the Covid-19 virus. 

Government spokesperson Mabrouq Azeez, speaking at a press conference today said that the authorities had not established whether Patient 21, who had no travel history nor any contact with another positive case, had been infected with the virus from Patient 23 or vice versa. National Emergency Operations Center's Medical Officer, Dr. Afzal also stated that the two cases had met and contact tracing was being conducted for either scenario where the one infected the other.

Mabrouq also stated that Patient 21 had exhibited symptoms of the virus from April 10. He added that the symptoms from Patient 23 were identified on April 8. Contact tracing was very much focused on identifying the individuals contacted since April 6. However, information about others in contact with the cases during the last 14 days will also be collected.

A total of 305 people has been isolated following contact with Patient 21 and Patient 23. 157 individuals in the High-Risk and Medium-Risk categories were quarantined. The confirmed cases tonight are individuals from the in the afore-mentioned categories.

They include 82 in High-Risk and 71 in the Medium-Risk category. 89 individuals determined as Low-Risk have  also been asked to home isolate.