KOCHI, India (Reuters) – Authorities in the southern Indian state of Kerala are taking precautionary measures after a 14-year-old boy died and 60 people were classified as high-risk due to the Nipah virus, the state’s health minister said on Sunday.
A Reuters investigation last year found parts of Kerala are among the areas in the world most at risk of an outbreak of the Nipah virus, which originates from animals such as fruit bats and pigs and can cause a high fever with brain swelling that can be fatal in humans.
The Nipah virus has been classified as a priority pathogen by the World Health Organization (WHO) due to its potential to cause epidemics. There is no vaccine to prevent infection and no treatment.
“The infected boy died on Sunday after suffering a cardiac arrest,” state Health Minister Veena George told local television reporters in Malayalam.
Earlier, in a statement on Saturday, she said that as part of the response to the Nipah virus, the government had ordered the establishment of 25 committees to identify and isolate infected people.
Dr Anoop Kumar, head of intensive care at Aster MIMS Hospital in Calicut, said one school-going boy has been diagnosed with Nipah virus and people who came in contact with him were being monitored.
“At this stage, the chances of a Nipah virus outbreak are minimal,” he said, adding that they would be monitoring the situation over the next seven to 10 days.
The statement said that 214 people were on the list of the boy’s primary contacts, of which 60 were in the high-risk category, and isolation wards had been set up at medical institutions to treat the patients.
According to local media reports, a case of Nipah virus infection was confirmed in Malappuram, a town about 350 km from the Kerala capital of Thiruvananthapuram, and the family of the infected patient was admitted to a local hospital for observation, while others who may be at risk of infection were asked to isolate themselves at home.
The state government said it was working to trace cases to stop the spread of the Nipah virus, which has been linked to dozens of deaths in the state since it was first identified there in 2018.
The virus was first identified in Malaysia 25 years ago and has caused outbreaks in Bangladesh, India and Singapore.
(Reporting by Shivaram Venkirassubramanian in Kochi and Manoj Kumar in New Delhi; Editing by Tom Hogue)
