COVID-19: Hotel in Spain with hundreds of guests locked down

 

  A hotel in Tenerife in Spain's Canary Islands has been locked down after a visiting Italian doctor tested positive for coronavirus, the media reported.

Hundreds of guests at the H10 Costa Adeje Palace Hotel were initially told to stay in their rooms as medical tests were carried out, the BBC reported on Tuesday citing the Spanish media.

The doctor is reportedly from the Lombardy region, where Italian authorities are battling an outbreak.

A leading Spanish newspaper quoted police sources as saying health authorities had ordered the monitoring of guests at the four-star hotel in the island.

One guest on Facebook posted an image of a note put under the door of their room on Tuesday saying: "We regret to inform you that for health reasons, the hotel has been closed down. Until the sanitary authorities warn, you must remain in your rooms."

Another guest, John Turton, told the BBC he and his wife had seen the note but then heard people walking outside and heading to breakfast.

Global cases of the virus have passed 80,000, the vast majority in China.

The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Monday the world should do more to prepare for a possible pandemic -- a situation where an infectious disease spreads easily between people in many countries.

The proportion of infected people who die appears to be between 1 per cent and 2 per cent, although the WHO cautions that the precise mortality rate is not known yet.

He said: "The hotel has been cordoned off but we're trying to make the best of what's going on. We haven't been given any more information other than the note but we're going to just wait, try and enjoy the holiday and see what happens."

The Italian doctor, who had been staying at the hotel with his wife, tested positive on Monday and has been placed in isolation at the University Hospital Nuestra Senora de Candelaria. He will undergo a second test to confirm the virus.

Previously, Spain had two confirmed cases, both tourists -- one German and one British -IANS