Deliberately didn't reveal Zika cases to public: Gujarat government

AHMEDABAD: A day after the World Health Organization (WHO) bulletin revealed that Ahmedabad had reported India's first three Zika virus cases, the state government on Sunday, for the first time, officially admitted that one positive Zika case was reported from Gopalnagar in the posh SP Stadium ward and two positive cases were reported from the Bapunagar area of the city.

Chief secretary J N Singh said that the cases were reported between November 2016 and February 2017. "The WHO bulletin wrongly reported about the February 2016 case," said Singh. He further said that all three patients are well and have shown no complications till now. "The two pregnant mothers, from Bapunagar and SP Stadium areas, have delivered healthy babies and the 64-year-old senior citizen has shown no complications so far," Singh said.

Singh admitted that even though the virus spreads through Aedes Aegypti mosquito, which is endemic to Ahmedabad, there was no cascading number in case of Zika. "So the government consciously did not go public with the cases. Our BJ Medical College lab informed the National Institute of Virology (NIV), Pune, which in turn informed ICMR and the Union government as per protocol," said Singh.

He later added that all three Zika virus cases were isolated where victims had no travel history to Zika virus-affected countries. "The NIV Pune is yet to give us a report on the gene sequencing of the virus to pinpoint the origin of the virus," said Singh.

Gujarat's health commissioner J P Gupta said, "As of now, we have not detected any fresh Zika virus cases. The virus may be present in the population. The risks are there. Pray that there are no fresh cases."

When asked why the public was not informed of the cases immediately, as per section 2.3 of WHO's 'Risk communication for Zika virus' protocol, Singh said, "Our BJ Medical College lab detected the first case on November 14, 2016 but it was finally confirmed by NIV on January 4, 2017," he said.

The second case of a 22-year-old pregnant woman was detected between January 6 and January 12, 2017 during a surveillance activity conducted by Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) and state health team in Bapunagar area, right in the midst when Vibrant Gujarat global summit was on and news of a bird flu outbreak was reported in Ahmedabad. When asked whether foreign delegates of Vibrant Gujarat summit in January and the recently concluded African Development Bank meetings this year were informed of the Zika virus cases, the officials did not comment.

In all, Gupta said more than 600 blood samples were collected from Bapunagar area and some 2,441 blood samples from across the city were sent to NIV Pune for Zika virus confirmation. "None of these samples have tested positive. Besides, test for Zika virus is conducted only if blood samples test negative for dengue and chikunguniya. None of the 1.2 crore blood smear samples collected from the state and 44 lakh samples collected from Ahmedabad have tested positive," said Gupta.