COVID-19: AMU Vice-Chancellor Writes To ICMR After 18 Professors Die In 20 Days

New Delhi: Aligarh Muslim University’s (AMU) head of medicine department, Shadaab Khan (58), Faculty of Law dean, Shakil Ahmed Samdani (59) and noted Sanskrit scholar Khalid Bin Yusuf (60) passed away among more than a dozen professors of the varsity due to COVID-19 in the last 20 days.

The fatalities of so many professors have led to panic and gloom on the campus, with the administration grappling to bring the situation under control.

“We have lost several of our very senior faculty members, the situation is very alarming here,” professor of mass communication and in-charge of the Public Relations Office (PRO) at AMU, Shafey Kidwai was quoted as saying by ThePrint.

“We have lost 18 serving teachers in the last 20 days, and it is a matter of huge concern for the university,” Kidwai said.

More than 100 patients are admitted in the university’s Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College (JNMC). Fears gripped the staff about the possibility of a more virulent strain of the virus wreaking havoc at the varsity.

Vice-Chancellor Tariq Mansoor on Sunday wrote to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), urging the body to analyse samples of the virus from the campus and conduct viral genome sequencing to ascertain if the fears are true. The VC lost his brother to COVID-19 last week.

“I kindly request you to instruct the concerned section/department of ICMR to perform analysis of Covid-19 samples sent from our lab to investigate for any particular viral variants of Covid-19 virus circulating in Aligarh, which may be giving rise to greater severity of disease, so that we may consider other epidemiological links and measures to control the same,” Professor Mansoor said in the letter.

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