• There are seven new cases of Covid-19, Health CS Mutahi Kagwe has said.
Image: DOUGLAS OKIDDY
The first and third patients in Kenya to contract Covid-19 have tested negative, Health CS Mutahi Kagwe has said.
A repeat test is scheduled in the next 48 hours to confirm the results.
Kagwe said he is hopeful the tests will turn out negative.
He spoke on Saturday, during the daily briefing on the Covid-19 situation.
Kagwe said there are seven new cases of Covid-19, bringing the total cases to 38.
However, one patient died on Thursday, so the active cases are 37.
All the new cases are from Nairobi, pushing the numbers to 28 in the county.
The new cases are four Kenyans, two Congolese and one Chinese.
They were drawn from 81 samples analysed in the last 24 hours.
Four of the patients had a history of travel, while two came from contacts of people who had previously tested positive for the disease.
Several medical staff at the Aga Khan University Hospital in Nairobi have been quarantined because they interacted with the 66-year-old man with Covid-19 who died.
The Star learnt the patient initially did not disclose to medics that he had travelled outside Kenya.
He presented himself to the hospital with mild fever and was prescribed medication to take at home.
"We do confirm that a number of our healthcare workers were exposed to a Covid-19 case by virtue of non-disclosure by the patient on their travel history," Dr Majid Twahir, an associate dean and the chief of staff at the hospital, told the Star.
The patient, who passed away on Thursday afternoon, returned to the hospital after three days when his condition worsened.
This time, he detailed his travel to southern Africa and was immediately admitted and secluded in a special area.
Tests for coronavirus returned positive results.
Dr Twahir said the staff who interacted with him in the first visit be quarantined 14 days as a precaution.
He said their exposure was classified into high or low risk and majority of them had low risk exposure.