3 Indians have tested positive for novel coronavirus so far (Photo Credit: Representational Image)
New Delhi:
In another measure taken to keep India safe from the novel coronavirus outbreak, foreigners who have been to China on or after January 15, 2020 will not be allowed to enter India. They are barred from entering India via air, land or seaport including land borders.
Till date, three Indians have tested positive for novel coronavirus.
Aviation regulator DGCA, ia a circular to airlines on Saturday, reiterated that all visas issued to Chinese nationals before February 5 have been suspended. Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) clarified, "These visa restrictions will not apply to aircrew, who may be Chinese nationals or other foreign nationalities coming from China."
"Foreigners who have been to China on or after January 15, 2020, are not allowed to enter India from any air, land or seaport, including Indo-Nepal, Indo-Bhutan, Indo-Bangladesh or Indo-Myanmar land borders," the DGCA said.
Among Indian airlines, IndiGo and Air India have suspended all of their flights between the two countries. SpiceJet continues to fly on Delhi-Hong Kong route. On February 1 and 2, Air India conducted two special flights to Chinese city of Wuhan, epicentre of the outbreak, evacuating 647 Indians and seven Maldivians.
Meanwhile, the death toll in China's coronavirus outbreak rose to 811 on Sunday, surpassing the number of fatalities in the 2002-03 SARS epidemic, while over 37,000 people have been confirmed as being infected with the deadly virus that has spread to more than 25 countries. Eighty-nine deaths were reported on Saturday - the highest single-day death toll - and there were 2,656 new confirmed cases of the deadly infection, China's National Health Commission said in its daily report on Sunday.
A total of 811 people have died of the disease so far and 37,198 confirmed cases have been reported in 31 provincial-level regions in China, according to the commission.
The death toll surpassed the number of fatalities in the 2002-2003 Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome or SARS epidemic that started in southern China and killed more than 700 people in the mainland, Hong Kong and elsewhere. Among the 89 deaths, 81 were from Hubei province, the epicentre of the virus outbreak, two in Henan, and one each in Hebei, Heilongjiang, Anhui, Shandong, Hunan and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, it said.
Meanwhile, the head of the World Health Organisation (WHO) said on Saturday that the UN health agency will send an international mission to China as it received a response from Beijing. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the team leader will leave early next week with the rest of the experts to follow. The UN health agency said the number of cases of the coronavirus in China is "stabilising", which is a "good news". It, however, cautioned that it was too early to make any predictions about whether the virus might have peaked.
