ONE of Scotland’s biggest hospitals has sent home a medic as a precaution after he visited a country at high risk of coronavirus infection.
According to a well-placed source, the member of staff at St John’s Hospital, Livingston, visited an area recently added to the official list of danger zones.
The Operating Department Practitioner (ODP), who assists surgeons, had returned to work following the overseas break.
But he was told to go home and self-isolate after the overseas area was recently reclassified as at-risk.
An insider revealed: “He’s not had any symptoms, but since the advice and countries listed as category one and two is being updated daily, the guidelines have changed. So he’s off to self isolate.
“I don’t think it was on the list when he came back to work, but then as the week went on the guidelines got updated and then it was.”
The decision comes after news that a coronavirus-infected surgeon at Aintree University Hospital in Liverpool operated on patients after failing to self-isolate following a trip to Italy.
The Scottish Government confirmed two new cases of COVID-19 in the Lothians yesterday, bringing the national total to 27.
NHS Lothian today declined to comment, saying they could not comment on individual cases and were concerned abut causing undue panic.
Yesterday, the whole of Italy was added to the category one list, meaning any returning travellers must self isolate, even if asymptomatic.
Current category one areas are Wuhan city and Hubei Province in China, Italy, Chaegu or Daegu and Cheongdo in the Republic of Korea and Iran.
The category two zones are all other regions of China, all other regions of Republic of Korea, Hong Kong, Macau Cambodia, Japan, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and Vietnam.
The Scottish Government have been approached for comment.
