Greece seals off refugee camp after 21 migrants test positive for coronavirus, beginning with a woman who gave birth at an Athens hospital

• Greece has sealed off the Ritsona refugee camp, near Athens, for two weeks 
• Comes after 21 people out of 63 tested were found to be sick with coronavirus 
• Outbreak was detected after woman gave birth at a hospital in the Greek capital 
• Hours earlier, the Prime Minister had boasted of health safeguards at the camps 

Greece on Thursday sealed off a migrant camp near Athens after 21 of its residents tested positive for the coronavirus.

The outbreak was first detected after a pregnant woman, believed to be of African origin, being held at the Ritsona camp gave birth in a hospital in Athens. 

Sixty three people were subsequently tested for the virus at the camp, of which 20 tests came back positive though the infected were not showing symptoms.

The Ritsona migrant camp, north of Athens, has been placed under ‘sanitary isolation’ for two weeks after 21 cases of coronavirus were confirmed there (file image)

The outbreak was first detected after a migrant woman who gave birth at an Athens hospital tested positive. 63 people at the camp were subsequently tested, of whom another 20 were positive (file image, migrants at the camp)

No staff were found to be carrying the virus. 

‘From today the facility is placed under sanitary isolation for two weeks,’ the migration ministry said in a statement.

Hours before the new cases were announced, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis had praised health safeguards at Greek camps.

‘I think we’re pretty good at contact tracing, and you can actually do contact tracing at the very beginning of an outbreak,’ Mitsotakis told CNN.

‘I think we have a very good track record of dealing with this problem in a very humane manner,’ the PM said, referring to dire camp overcrowding.

‘We will continue to keep a very, very close eye on what is happening in our camps… We’re ramping up medical facilities,’ he said. 

The new mother’s case was the first among asylum-seekers living in a Greek camp. 

The state has run several vaccination campaigns in past years, but no screening had been done for the present virus.

Greece has so far confirmed 1,415 cases of coronavirus – a low level compared to some of its European neighbours but ordered the entire country into lockdown last month

Officials carry out disinfection works at National Library of Greece and its surroundings in Athens on April 1

All access to Ritsona camp has been restricted and food will be delivered to the residents, the migration ministry said. 

Additional medical staff will be sent to the area and all residents will be screened, it added.

As of 1600 GMT on Wednesday, Greece’s population of 11 million had recorded 50 deaths and 1,415 cases of novel coronavirus.

In camps on the Greek mainland and islands, where tens of thousands of asylum seekers live in overcrowded and unhygienic conditions, regulations have been announced to keep residents as far from the local population as possible.

The migration ministry on Thursday said that another asylum-seeker living in a flat in the northern city of Kilkis had tested positive after giving birth at a local clinic.

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