Bengaluru, Feb 16 (IANS): As many as 103 residents, mostly aged above 60, of an apartment in a Bengaluru suburb, have tested positive for Covid-19 after attending a social gathering in their complex, officials said on Tuesday.

Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike Commissioner N. Manjunatha Prasad told reporters that 103 people out of 1,052 residents of the SNN Lake View Apartments in Bommanahalli tested positive.

Representational image

"We have tested 1,052 residents of the apartment; one person is admitted in the hospital and others are in quarantine. The civic body had put in place various measures, including isolating and quarantining those who had tested positive and we have intensified contact tracing," he said.

Bengaluru civic body officials said that there was a party on February 4 in the apartment, in which most of the residents participated.

According to officials, the residents got to know that the infection had spread after some of them got themselves tested before a planned trip to Dehradun.

"On February 10, their test results came positive and immediately they alerted the Residents Welfare Association of the apartment... the BBMP was informed and tested the residents," Prasad said.

"Most are asymptomatic and none of them so far had any travel history. We have declared a containment zone as per the protocol of the Health Ministry, and groceries and daily essentials are supplied to the residents in the apartment," he added.

The Commissioner said that samples have been sent to the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro-Sciences (Nimhans) to find the variant of the virus.

With 96 people who have tested positive above the age of 60 years, he said that the civic body was keeping watch on people with comorbidities, the elderly, pregnant ladies, children in the apartment.

This is the second such cluster in Bengaluru in the last three days. On February 14, 40 students (35 girls and 5 boys) from a nursing college in R.T. Nagar had tested positive for Covid-19 and just before that, over 40 students from Mangaluru had tested positive as well.

Prasad, who interacted virtually with more than 300 Resident Welfare Associations (RWA) on Covid measures, sought their cooperation, noting that they were fighting "an invisible enemy".

"Caution is the only thing which works to beat this enemy. If we throw caution to the winds, then this enemy attacks mercilessly. We all need to work hard to keep a check on this virus," he said.

He added that RWAs must take their affected residents to government hospitals where the recovery rate is very high.