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4 more suspected cases in Jalandhar
Dharmendra Joshi
Tribune News Service

The nodal officer for swine flu in Punjab, Dr Deepak Bhatia, told The Tribune that suspected patient Mandeep Kaur tested negative, according to the report of her blood sample received from NICD on late Tuesday evening.

Jalandhar, June 16
Four more suspected patients of swine flu have been found after their screening in Jalandhar today. With the new cases, total number of confirmed and suspected swine flu patients has risen to 14.

These patients have been quarantined in a special isolation ward at the Civil Hospital here. All patients are students of Guru Amar Dass Public School located in Model Town in Jalandhar. They were part of a 34-member group of students and teachers of this school returned after an education tour from NASA on Saturday. The blood samples of the four new suspected patients - Daljinder Singh, Rohit Kalra, Sanjiv Mahey and Arvind Mahey - are likely to be submitted at the NICD, Delhi, on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, the blood sample reports of nine of the 10 other patients were received on Monday. Of them, seven students, including a girl, were tested positive and are being treated at the isolation ward in Jalandhar.

The four-member team of the National Institute of Communicable Disease (NICD), Delhi, led by Dr Shah Hussain and a two-member team of project coordinator of Integrated Disease Surveillance Project (IDSP) led by Dr Deepak Bhatia, also nodal officer for swine flu in Punjab, has also been camping in Jalandhar since Monday.