HAVANA, Cuba – Cuba is the latest Caribbean county to have confirmed cases of the coronavirus (COVID-19) following confirmation from health officials that tourists have been diagnosed.
The three Italian tourists are now at the Pedro Kouri Medicine Institute in isolation.
According to Cuban public health officials, four Italian tourists traveling together arrived to Havana on Monday. They traveled to the Sancti Spiritus province to stay at a hostel in the city of Trinidad, officials said.
On Tuesday, the four Italians were tested for COVID-19. Only three tested positive, officials said. The epidemiological investigation into the cases continues.
A press release from the Ministry of Public Health said:
The evolution of the three confirmed patients is favorable and none to date presents a danger to their lives.
Our country has been preparing to confront the pandemic caused by the appearance of the new coronavirus, which affects more than one hundred countries today and has caused a considerable number of sick and deceased.
As a result of the implementation of the National Plan for the Prevention and Control of this disease, and the intensive surveillance of Respiratory Syndromes, suspicious cases have been identified and hospitalized.
On March 10, 2020, four Italian tourists with respiratory symptoms were identified who were staying in a hostel in the city of Trinidad in Sancti Spíritus province and who had arrived at the José Martí International Airport in Havana on Monday, March 9, traveling that same day to Trinidad.
They were immediately admitted to the Pedro Kouri Institute of Tropical Medicine (IPK), in Havana.
On March 11, 2020, the IPK National Reference Laboratory reported that three of the four tourists isolated since the previous day were positive for the New Coronavirus SARS CoV-2.
Epidemiological surveillance and control actions are being carried out on people identified as contacts, who remain asymptomatic.
The evolution of the three confirmed patients is favorable and none to date have been in life-threatening situations.
