The number of people struck down with coronavirus at a packed Tenerife hotel where dozens of Brits are staying doubled overnight.
Another two tourists were quarantined in hospital after testing positive for the killer virus.
An Italian doctor and his wife who had been staying at the H Costa Adeje Palace had already been transferred to Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria University Hospital.
Two other Italians who were part of the group of 15 holidaymakers they flew to the island with on February , were quarantined in the same hospital late yesterday after testing positive.
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Employees at the hotel were pictured wearing protective masks as they spoke to guests (Image: via REUTERS)
News of the fresh cases came as hundreds of tourists were told they must remain in the hotel at the center of the coronavirus scare.
The decision, announced by regional health chiefs and Canary Islands president Angel Victor Torres last night at a press conference, opens up the prospect of British tourists having to spend nearly a fortnight locked in at the H Costa Adeje Palace before the standard incubation period ends.
Mr Torres said the “hundred and odd” tourists who had checked into the H Costa Adeje Palace on Monday – and had had no contact with the Italian doctor and his wife who tested positive for coronavirus – could leave today.
Guests are being kept in their rooms at the hotel (Image: Ramón de la Rocha / EPA-EFE / REX)
The number of infected at the H Costa Adeje Palace Hotel doubled overnight (Image: AFP via Getty Images)
He added: “The others will have to be subject to active individual monitoring. ”
Domingo Nunez, head of Epidemiology of the Canary Islands Health Service, defended the decision to keep the hotel on lockdown yesterday after it emerged a guest had tested positive for coronavirus.
He said: “We are convinced there wasn’t another option to the measures that were adopted, at least as an initial measure of contention against the spread of the virus.
“It was necessary to establish the initial hotel quarantine.”
Some guests have been transported to hospital (Image: PA)
Police blocked the. entrance to the hotel
(Image: REUTERS)Setting out the immediate future for most of the holidaymakers currently in the hotel, he added: “Guests will have to stay in the hotel without leaving the hotel.
” Those who have symptoms will be evaluated and will stay in the hotel without leaving their rooms and depending on the results of the tests and whether they test positive or negative, a further decision would then be taken.
“If they tested positive they would be transferred to hospital.
“The people who are not showing any symptoms can move freely inside the hotel, although under certain conditions such as using the facemarks which are now available.
An Italian doctor sparked the lockdown after he tested positive for coronavirus (Image: Europa Press via Getty Images)
Some guests are being allowed to leave today (Image: Europa Press via Getty Images)
“But they still won’t be able to leave the hotel.
“Once we have new information, we will come to a consensus with the Ministry of Health about what we’re going to do.
“But at the moment the situation and the outlook is that people will have to stay inside the hotel.”
The group of Italians the unnamed doctor was part of are expected to be the focus of the medical team that will now remain in the hotel 381 / 7.
Another Italians staying in the hotel were the next group to be tested for the virus yesterday.
Around British TUI customers are staying at the hotel (Image: REUTERS)
Around Brits traveling with TUI are known to be in the hotel.
Officials say the guests come from nationalities including Belgians, Dutch and Brits.
Since the weekend Spain has gone from having no current confirmed cases of coronavirus to seven – the four in Tenerife, one in Barcelona, one in Castellon and another in Madrid.
At least five are Italians and the other two are said to have returned to Spain after trips to Italy, where coronavirus has claimed the lives of people so far.
The Tenerife hotel at the center of the coronavirus alert has announced it is closing till the middle of March.
Coronavirus outbreak
H Costa Adeje Palace chiefs say the move is being taken to “guarantee the safety of guests and staff.”
The reopening date has been given as March .
A message that comes up in Spanish on the hotel’s website when prospective guests try to make a booking for the start of March says: “To guarantee the safety of guests and staff, the H Costa Adeje Place will remain temporarily closed until March .
“All those clients who have booked a holiday before then will be contacted and diverted to other hotels in our group in Tenerife.”
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