Chandigarh:
Days after eight Asiatic lions in the Hyderabad zoo tested positive for COVID-19, authorities in Punjab announced that all zoos and wildlife sanctuaries in the state will remain closed till May 31 as a precautionary measure.
Zoo officials said animals were being closely monitored.
All zoos and wildlife sanctuaries in Punjab will remain closed for the public till May 31, state officials said.
At Mahendra Chaudhary Zoological Park, popularly known as Chhatbir Zoo, about 20 km from here and spread over 505 acres, officials said the animals were being closely monitored.
On Tuesday, the CSIR-Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology said that eight Asiatic lions in the Hyderabad zoo have tested positive for COVID-19.
It said the animals must have got the infection through the zoo-keeping staff.
The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change had said the infected animals were behaving normally.
According to reports, earlier, lions and tigers had tested positive for COVID-19 in zoos in Bar.
Meanwhile,samples of some of the animals including a lion had been sent to the Indian Veterinary Research Institute (IVRI) in Bareilly for testing of COVID-19 infection, said National Zoological Park authorities.
"Samples of some of the animals including a lion had been sent to Indian Veterinary Research Institute (IVRI) in Bareilly. Nothing adverse has been informed or reported so far. Detailed reports are awaited," Director National Zoological Park, Ramesh Pandey said.
The director further said that he has been getting messages about COVID-19 (SARS COV-2) in animals of various Zoos and action regarding the matter being taken in the National Zoological Park.
Pandey informed that the drills of sanitization never stopped in National Zoological Park after the COVID-19 outbreak.
Earlier, two lionesses have tested positive for COVID-19 at Etawah Safari Park in Uttar Pradesh. Besides this, eight Asiatic lions housed in the Nehru Zoological Park (NZP) Hyderabad have tested positive for SARS-CoV2 virus.