25 Indian Navy sailors test positive for coronavirus

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, April 18

In a significant development, 25 sailors of the Indian Navy have tested positive for Covid-19.

All of them are from the shore-based logistics hub INS Angre, in Mumbai, headquarters of the Western Naval Command.

Naval officials confirmed on Saturday morning that 25 sailors had tested positive and were under treatment at INHS Asvini, Naval Hospital at Colaba in Mumbai.

The 25 sailors had shown no symptoms, but were quarantined after a fellow sailor had tested positive some days back. INS Angre is tasked with supplying logistics to naval units.

Indian Navy officials said “INS Angre is under a total lockdown”. The Navy added there were no Covid-19 cases on board the warships or submarines.

There are more than a dozen ships of the Navy on patrol duty along the shore and also on deployment such as those for anti-piracy off the coast of Oman on the western sea board of India, as also near the Malacca Straits to the east. Besides, long-range surveillance planes of the Navy are doing daily sorties on both sides of the peninsula.

These are the first en bloc cases observed in the Navy, even as the US and French navies are grappling with thousands of positive cases.

The Indian Army has so far reported eight positive coronavirus cases. “We have only eight positive cases in the entire Army. Of the eight, two are doctors and one nursing assistant. Four are responding well to the treatment,” Army Chief General M.M. Naravane said on Friday.