No report of missing ill foreigner: Immigration

Maldives Immigration has said today that no foreign national suspected of having a communicable disease has been reported missing.

This comes after a social media post circulated yesterday, featuring the name and photos of a Bangladeshi worker employed at a factory in Vilimale’. The post, shared by a Maldivian working there, alleged that the individual might be infected and was missing.

However, when contacted by Mihaaru News, an Immigration official said that no such report has been filed with the agency, and as a result, authorities are not searching for the individual in question.

According to posts shared online, the individual is a 31-year-old Bangladeshi man who has been residing in Maldives since 2014. He was employed at a factory in Vilimale’, where he had been working for the past two years.

A factory worker told Mihaaru News that the man was recently diagnosed with an infectious disease following a medical test required for his visa renewal. While the specific illness was not disclosed, Health Protection Agency (HPA) informed the company that the disease is communicable.

The company then decided to send the individual back for treatment, and he had boarded the ferry to Velana International Airport on the morning of May 26. However, it later emerged that the man never boarded a flight and had not left the country.