BREAKING 61 cases of Covid-19 were detected among 600 passengers on two KLM flights from South Africa

Dutch health authorities said that 61 people who arrived in Amsterdam on two flights from South Africa on Friday tested positive for Covid-19.

Around 600 passengers arrived at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport on the two KLM flights on Friday and then faced hours of delays and testing due to concerns over the new virus variant.

• UPDATE Netherlands finds 13 new Covid variant cases among South Africa passengers.

The Dutch Health Ministry estimated said on Saturday that 61 tests had come back positive.

“Travellers with a positive test result will be placed in isolation at a hotel at or near Schiphol,” health authorities said in a statement. “Of the positive test results, we are researching as quickly as possible whether they are the new variant of concern, now named ‘Omicron’.”

The Dutch government banned all air travel from southern Africa early on Friday. Health Minister Hugo de Jonge said that passengers already en route to the Netherlands would have to undergo testing and quarantine upon arrival.

Passengers on the two KLM flights, from Cape Town and Johannesburg, said they were kept waiting on the tarmac for hours.

A spokesman for the health authorities in Kennemerland, the Dutch region that oversees Schiphol, said the positive cases were being analysed by a Dutch academic medical hospital to determine whether they are the new strain.