Chattogram confirms first COVID-19 case

An elderly man in Chattogram has been tested positive for the novel coronavirus, marking the first confirmed case in the port city.

The man, who is now undergoing treatment at the isolation ward of the Chattogram General Hospital, is 67 years old, according to the local administration.

The patient was diagnosed positive for COVID-19 at Faujdarhat’s Bangladesh Institute of Tropical and Infectious Diseases (BITID) on Friday, said Chattogram district civil surgeon Sheikh Fazle Rabbi.

“We’re trying to find out how he was infected and other details,” he told Prothom Alo.

The man was hospitalised on Thursday at the Chattogram General Hospital with coronavirus symptoms, said hospital authorities adding that the patient had no travel history neither any contract with overseas returnees recently.

Chattogram deputy commissioner Md Elias Hossain told Prothom Alo that police locked down the patient’s house.

The patient might have been infected by local transmission. People of Chattogram are taking the disease lightly.

They are roaming around freely and the mosques are still crowded, he added.