China quarantines 63 Aeroflot passengers after traveller from Iran becomes its first imported coronavirus case
- Infected person had arrived from Tehran via Moscow and passed medical check at Shanghai airport before later testing positive
- Authorities looking for those who had close contact with the patient, while Iran reports a growing number of cases
On Thursday, 63 people in Shanghai who had close contact with a passenger on an Aeroflot flight who was diagnosed with Covid-19 – the disease caused by the virus – had been traced and sent to quarantine for observation, according to a spokesman for the Shanghai Health Commission.
The infected traveller, whose age, gender and nationality were not disclosed, arrived in China on Thursday last week and was diagnosed on Wednesday. Chinese health authorities were looking urgently for further people who had close contact with the patient en route.
According to the health authorities, the infected person caught Aeroflot Russian Airlines flight SU513 from Tehran Imam Khomeini airport on the evening of February 19, transferred at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport overnight, and arrived at Shanghai Pudong airport the following evening on Aeroflot flight SU206.
They stayed in a capsule hotel for 16 hours during the stopover in Moscow, and spent two nights in a Shanghai hotel, where they received an item from a delivery man.
