Experts Baffled As 57 Sailors in Argentina Catch Covid-19 After 35 Days At Sea

• A mysterious medical case has puzzled experts after 57 crew members of a fishing trawler in Argentina caught coronavirus.
• This is despite the fact that they have all undergone mandatory quarantine and testing before their departure.

Authorities in Argentina are currently in a state of confusion because of a mysterious coronavirus case. As recent reports tell us, sailors have been found positive of Covid-19 after they have been at sea for 35 days. Eventually, the Echizen Maru fishing trawler had been forced to return to port after several crew members showed Covid-19 symptoms.

This is despite the fact that all 61 crew members have tested negative of the virus before leaving port. Plus all of them were required to a mandatory 14-day quarantine in a hotel in Ushuaia prior to their departure.

Now they had to undergo another testing and this time, 57 of them tested positive of the virus.

As of this writing, two sailors have tested negative while two others are still waiting for the results. Two have also been confined at a hospital.

The case has since puzzled the country’s health officials as they tried to solve the mystery of how the sailors contracted the contagious disease, despite of efforts to prevent it.

Tierra del Fuego primary health care director Alejandra Alfaro shared:

“It’s hard to establish how this crew was infected, considering that for 35 days, they had no contact with dry land and that supplies were only brought in from the port of Ushuaia.”

The fishing boat has since docked at Ushuaia but the crew members are not permitted to disembark.

Meanwhile, Ushuaia Regional Hospital infectious diseases department head Leandro Ballatore pointed out that this may be a “case that escapes all description in publications, because an incubation period this long has not been described anywhere.”

“We cannot yet explain how the symptoms appeared,” he admitted.

As of this reporting, Argentina has recorded 136,118 confirmed coronavirus cases, with a death toll of 2,490.