SIMFEROPOL, March 30. /TASS/. A criminal case has been initiated in Crimea over a medical employee who was infected with the coronavirus, Crimean Deputy Police Chief Alexander Smaglin announced Monday.

Earlier, Natalia Penkovskaya, head of the Crimea and Sevastopol Division of the Russian Federal Service for Surveillance on Consumer Rights Protection and Human Wellbeing, disclosed that an infected individual visited a medical center and infected a doctor during a medical examination.

Crimean Head Sergei Aksyonov contacted the regional Interior Ministry’s directorate and the Prosecutor’s Office, proposing to initiate criminal proceeding against the first case of a coronavirus infection by a person who violated the self-isolation regime.

"A criminal proceeding was initiated against a person who violated the set requirements on self-isolation and infected another person," the governor said.

The regional Interior Ministry press service told TASS that the criminal proceeding was initiated on charges of violation of sanitary and epidemiologic rules.

In Crimea, 2,873 people remain under observation; 2,801 of them are self-isolated, 62 remain in hospitals, and 10 stay in medical observation facilities. The region reports 15 confirmed coronavirus infection cases.

The coronavirus outbreak was recorded in central China in late December 2019. A total of 199 countries and territorieshave been hit by this infection, which was labeled as a pandemic by the World Health Organization in March 2020. According to the latest data, over 730,000 people have contracted the virus, and more than 34,000 have died.

Russia reports over 1,830 coronavirus cases, 9 fatalities and 66 recoveries.