Second case at Austrian hospital after medic tested positive for coronavirus

ZURICH (Reuters) – One person has tested positive for coronavirus in the neonatal care department of Austria’s university hospital Uniklinum Salzburg after an anesthesiologist contracted the virus, the regional authorities reported on Sunday.

An anesthesiologist who had recently visited the Paznaun Valley in Tyrol, where Austria’s first cases were reported and where 245 cases had been confirmed as of Sunday morning, tested positive after returning from his visit and continuing his work for four days beginning last Sunday.

100 people have been put in quarantine, the government said. Hospital areas affected include the neonatal care, facial surgery, anesthesia, and the ear, nose and throat departments, as well as an air rescue unit and the intensive care unit of one surgery department.

Regional authorities did not specify whether the second case confirmed on Sunday related to a patient or worker in the hospital’s neonatal care unit. A spokesman was not immediately available for comment.

“This is a serious situation, but experts confirm that the ongoing operation (of the hospital) can currently be continued,” Salzburg Deputy Governor Christian Stöckl said in a statement.

The government previously said parents of patients in neonatal care were being personally informed, while other precautionary measures had been taken within the hospital.

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