Eight children in ‘Fiyavathi’, a children’s shelter located in Hulhumalé have tested positive for the Covid-19 outbreak.

During Wednesday night’s press briefing, the Health Emergency Operations Center (HEOC) spokesperson, Dr. Fathimath Nazla Rafeeq revealed that the first case to have been detected in the children’s shelter surfaced on October 1, after samples that were collected from a staff member on September 30, returned positive for the infection.

Authorities immediately launched contact tracing following which 54 contacts were identified and immediately placed in quarantine.

19 samples were taken from these individuals and two samples, one of a caretaker and the other of a child, returned positive on October 4.

The following day, random samples were collected as quarantined were children.

On October 6, 10 more cases were identified out of the quarantined individuals; three caretakers and seven children. Another caretaker is to have tested positive on Wednesday according to HEOC.

Dr. Nazla noted that some of the contact are considered to come under the high-risk category.

The Ministry of Gender, Family and Social Services has since revealed via a statement, that one of the high-risk patients, a child, has since been transferred to the Hulhumalé Medical Facility (HMF) along with a caretaker. The child is reportedly doing well and is being monitored.

Under the instructions of the Health Protection Agency (HPA) and HEOC, the remaining positive children have been moved to Covid-19 facilities and are doing well, stated the ministry.

In addition, the ministry also decided to move the caretakers and 26 children located on the floor where the contacts were quarantined, elsewhere, after informing the relevant institutions tasked with the responsibility of monitoring them.

The statement goes on to read that the children have been moved to a 12-room, three-story building, where their requirements and education will be provided uninterruptedly.

This is the first time children at a shelter have tested positive for the infection.

HEOC assured that the required precautionary measures have been taken at the shelter, to ensure the virus does not spread further.

Maldives has 10,656 confirmed coronavirus cases since the first few cases emerged in the island nation on March 7. Authorities reveal that there are 63 patients currently hospitalized for treatment out of which two remain in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of HMF.