Nima Wangdi

The oldest person to contract Covid-19 in the country, a 103-year-old woman from Tading in Samtse, is in a stable condition according to the health officials looking after her. She tested positive for Covid-19 yesterday.

Kuensel learned that the woman has no co-morbidities except for being frail and bedridden due to old age. She could not be transported in vehicles, as she suffers from severe motion sickness.

“As per the request from family members, she is currently being managed at home. The patient has also refused to move away from home,” sources said.

Sources said that the patient might have to be shifted to an isolation ward in a hospital if she developed severe symptoms later.

The head of the Department of Medicine of Jigme Dorji Wangchuck national referral hospital, Dr Guru P Dhakal is monitoring the case on daily basis.

Dr Dhakal said he calls the patient twice a day to check her status. “The patient is in a stable condition besides a mild cough and mild shortness of breath, which she had before testing positive, due to her old age. She also had a swallowing problem from before.”

He said the medicines and the fingertip pulse oximeter have been delivered. Health officials have also trained her grandson how to use the oximeter. “He’ll be monitoring the readings.”

“As of 9pm yesterday, the patient did not have new complaints and took the medicines after dinner yesterday,” Dr Dhakal said. The last oxygen saturation recorded yesterday was 94 percent.

Dr Guru P Dhakal also  attended and monitored the country’s first Covid-19 patient, the American elderly man who was detected on March 5, 2020.

Meanwhile, the country recorded the one-day highest positive cases with 527 new cases yesterday.

Three positive cases were declared from a building in Changbangdu yesterday morning. Five more positive cases, all close contacts of the three cases, were detected later yesterday evening. The buildings were cordoned off immediately.

However, 128 people living in Royal Academic Performing Arts campus, which was earlier identified as a red cluster, tested negative yesterday.