Five Britons Test Positive For Coronavirus In France

By AFP

Five British nationals including a child have tested positive for the new coronavirus in France, the health minister said Saturday, adding that they had all stayed at the same ski chalet.

France has now detected a total of 11 cases of the novel coronavirus. The new “cluster” is centred on a Briton who had returned from Singapore and stayed in Contamines-Montjoie, near Mont Blanc in the French Alps for four days from January 24, Health Minister Agnes Buzyn said.

“They show no serious signs” of a life-threatening infection added Buzyn, herself a doctor.

The Briton at the centre of the new cases is now in Britain and was not counted among the French tally, she told a press conference.

In addition to the five Britons who have tested positive for the virus, six other Britons staying in the same chalet have also been hospitalised for observation, the minister said.

Altogether there were seven adults on holiday in one apartment in the chalet and a father with his three children who lived in another, local authorities said.

Authorities in France and Singapore are now trying to contact people who came into close contact with the initially infected Briton, she said.

He was on a business trip and had stayed at a hotel on January 22-22 for an event with 94 other foreigners, according to senior health official Jerome Salomon who attended the press briefing along with Buzyn.

Other “clusters” have been identified in Malaysia and South Korea around people who attended the same event, he said.

Singapore officials say 109 people in all — some of them from Hubei, the Chinese province at the heart of the health crisis — attended the meeting at the Grand Hyatt hotel.

All foreign participants have since left Singapore and the health authorities of their home countries have been notified, they added.

The UK authorities said they were aware of the latest development and were “contacting people who were in close contact with any of the cases that have been confirmed in the UK, to provide them with health advice.”

“We are working closely with the French authorities,” Public Health England said in a statement.

The 11 Britons were sent to hospitals in Lyon, Grenoble, and Saint-Etienne.

The novel coronavirus which erupted in Wuhan, central China, in December has already infected more than 34,500 people and killed more than 700, according to the latest official figures from China.