Kochi: Two confirmed cases of Nipah virus in Kozhikode Kerala have sent the state and central governments on medical alert.
Samples of a couple of patients were sent to the ICMR-National Institute of Virology, Pune, which has confirmed the virus as that of Nipah, media reports said.
Family members of a 49-year-old deceased person have been admitted at the hospital with fever and are under observation. The first Nipah outbreak was reported in Kerala in 2018 when 17 deaths were reported.
A 12-year-old boy succumbed to the infection in Kozhikode district in September 2021.
The Nipah virus, which was first detected in Malaysia in 1998, is spread through fruit bats and pigs are intermediate hosts.
According to the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) the virus can be transmitted to humans from animals and can also be transmitted directly from human-to-human.
Nipah confirmed
