Kudos to Kerala on Efficient Handling of the Nipah Virus Outbreak
Visit Nipah virus: Anatomy of an outbreak a report in the Hindu newspaper.
Kozhikode: Kozhikode and Malappuram districts, where 17 people died of
Nipah in May, were declared free of the virus by the Kerala government in July
2018. "A decision to declare both districts as Nipah-virus-free was taken by
the government as no fresh cases have been reported after June 1," health
minister K.K. Shylaja said.
She was speaking at an event to felicitate medical teams, support staff and
volunteers who fought against the spread of the virus.
Sajeesh, husband of 28-year-old nurse Lini Puthuserry who died after
contracting the virus while attending to patients at Perumbra Taluk Hospital,
was among those honoured.
The Collectors of Kozhikode and Malapurram districts, U.V. Jose and Amit
Kumar Meena, and Manipal Virology Institute director G. Arunkumar were also
honoured. Dr A.S. Anoop Kumar of the Kozhikode-based Baby Memorial Hospital was
presented with a special award for his efforts to identify and prevent the
virus outbreak.
The government had on June 11 lifted the travel advisory it had issued in
the wake of the virus and said it was safe to travel to any part of the state.
It is heartening to see how they have managed the crisis efficiently. It is
frightening to think of what could have happened if the outbreak had happened
in a place where healthcare is not as efficient as it seems to have been in
Kerala.
The speed with which Kozhikode’s Baby Memorial Hospital seems to have ruled
out alternative hypotheses and suspected Nipah infection is impressive. The availability
of a very competent critical care doctor and an equally competent neurologist
there to handle the first set of Nipah victims speaks highly of the state of
health care in Kerala.
Credit for the second impressive feat belongs to a private institution in
Karnataka – which has been operating the Manipal Centre for Virus Research
(MCVR) - and to Dr Arunkumar, Prof and Head of the Department at MCVR. In 2017
MCVR had sent a team to the US Centre for Disease control. One of the actions
taken was training some members of the visiting team for testing samples to
identify the presence or absence of the Nipah infection. This test can be
currently done only at two places in India: National Institute of Virology,
Pune and MCVR.
The Kerala hospital sent samples to MCVR, 300 KM away, for quick
identification of the virus involved. MCVR under the Manipal University has
also been supported by the Govt of India. This public-private partnership in
the critical area of public health shows what can be done in India when
dedicated leadership is available.
