Seven inbound passengers test positive for coronavirus at Karachi airport

KARACHI: Seven inbound passengers have tested positive for coronavirus at Karachi’s Jinnah International Airlines who arrived in Pakistan through a foreign airline from Saudi Arabia, ARY News reported on Saturday.

The COVID-19 test of seven passengers came positive at the Karachi airport during the examination of 254 inbound travellers from Saudi Arabia who disembarked from a foreign airline’s flight from Jeddah.

According to the airport administration, the COVID-positive passengers have been shifted to the hospital for spending quarantine period prescribed by the health authorities.

Read: Wagah immigration lets Indian embassy staff in with deadly Covid variant

Earlier on Friday, five passengers who arrived at Peshawar’s Bacha Khan International Airport from Abu Dhabi had tested positive for Covid-19.

A total of 153 passengers on board a Pakistan International Airline (PIA) flight, PK-218, had landed at the airport. They were subjected to rapid antigen tests upon arrival at the airport.

Five of them were found to carrying the deadly virus and shifted to a hospital’s isolation ward.

Earlier in the day, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) notified fresh travel restrictions for inbound passengers amid the third wave of coronavirus pandemic.

Read: Inbound passengers to undergo COVID test at airports as NCOC devises fresh protocols

In wake of the third wave of COVID-19, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) added 15 more countries in category C of the international travel list.

The CAA updated its category C for international travel and added Bangladesh, Iran, Iraq and other countries to the list. India, Brazil, South Africa, Portugal, Nepal are already included in the list. The number of countries included in category C currently stands at 38.

Those coming from countries in the C travel category will have to take prior permission from the National Command and Operations Centre (NCOC).

Read: COVID-19 test: CAA issues list of designated labs for passengers from Gulf countries

The aviation authority extended the travel restrictions of 38 countries placed in Category C in view of the decisions taken by the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC).

According to fresh advisory, passengers will undergo Rapid Antigen Testing on arrival at Airports in Pakistan, while negative cases will undergo 10 days self-quarantine at home with stringent Trace, Test & Quarantine (TTQ) protocols. The new travel restrictions will remain in effect until May 23.