Stay home, pleads UK mum whose baby has virus

LONDON • An exasperated British woman whose 11-week-old baby tested positive for the highly contagious Covid-19 virus has pleaded for people to stay at home to break its chain of transmission.

Mother-of-four Jodie Louise Banister, 30, said her youngest child, Ares, was diagnosed with the coronavirus on Tuesday, a day after he was admitted to the Leicester Royal Infirmary with a high temperature, the BBC reported.

Mrs Banister wrote in a Facebook post that same day: "So while you're all still... going out and about without a care in the world, going to the supermarket every day for those absolute essentials you just had to have and going out for your three-hour-long walks that you've never done before in your lives... our 11-week-old baby has just tested positive for Covid-19.

"We haven't been out for weeks but unfortunately (my husband) Christian still has to go to work to make sure Tesco has food on the shelves ready for you all to ransack and hoard."

She added: "Because there's no treatment for Covid, they can only make (Ares) comfortable."

Mrs Banister, from Leicester, also urged people who are not essential service workers to not leave their homes unnecessarily.

She told the BBC her family has been taking precautions to keep the house coronavirus-free by regularly cleaning the door handles and surfaces. When her husband comes home from work, he would leave his clothes in a separate wash bag at the door.

She now hopes the rest of her family members do not have the disease that has infected more than 103,000 people in Britain - among the highest in the world - including over 13,700 who died.

Britain has been under a nationwide lockdown since March 23.