India has said that it intends to convert some railway carriages into health isolation wards for patients infected with Coronavirus while the authorities are rushing to equip the country’s health infrastructure for an expected rise in cases.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked India's 1.3 billion people last week to stay at their homes for three weeks in the world's largest closure in a bid to curb the spread of the disease.
The network of Indian trains, the lifeline of the country, has stopped.
The Indian Railways Company said in a statement on Saturday that a train carriage had been converted into a prototype for a sanitary insulation facility.
The company stated on its website that, upon obtaining approval, the plan requires that each of the Indian railways convert ten wagons to such wards every week.
The Indian Railways Company has 16 districts.
India has reported 918 cases of coronavirus, including 19 deaths.