MADRID, May 30 (Xinhua) -- Fourteen passengers on a flight from Madrid to Lanzarote, Canary Islands, were placed in quarantine on Friday after one of them tested positive for the coronavirus while he was on the plane.

The passenger who tested positive has been confirmed by the Canary Islands regional authority as a resident on the island, who had travelled to the province of Ciudad Real (central Spain) to be with his mother, who died of cancer.

The mother also tested positive for COVID-19 and the man subsequently took a PCR test to see if he was infected. Instead of self-isolating and waiting for the test result, the man decided to fly back to Lanzarote and received a positive test result while on the plane.

The government of Canary Islands activated its protocols in the wake of the positive report. And the man was met by police and health authorities on landing at Lanzarote's Cesar Manrique airport.

He now faces a heavy fine for breaking the strict regulations put into place by Spain's State of Alarm. And if anyone else from the flight tests positive, he could also face criminal charges for crimes against public health.

The other 13 passengers have been asked to to spend the next 14 days in quarantine.

Speaking in his daily press conference on Friday, Fernando Simon, director of the Coordination Centre for Health Alerts and Emergencies of the Ministry of Health, said that the passenger "should not have travelled and should have been in quarantine." He also explained that the swift action taken by authorities was "a clear example of our rapid detection process."

Lanzarote, off the northwest coast of Africa, has so-far escaped the worst of the coronavirus pandemic with only 84 confirmed cases and three deaths from COVID-19 among its 151,000 inhabitants. There are currently only three active cases on the island with no new case diagnosed since April 30. Enditem

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