As migrant workers reach their homes in rural and urban areas, the Government is now using primary health centres too as platforms for conducting Covid-19 tests with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) saying that on an average 1.20-lakh tests are being conducted daily. This even as the ICMR denied that the country has started witnessing community transmission as alleged by some health groups in the country.
Senior scientist at the ICMR Nivedita Gupta said that "indigenous platforms" are being used too for "ramping up Covid-19 testing capacity”.
“Truenat screening and confirmatory tests have now been validated. Outreach of testing has hence been increased since this is available in primary health centres and districts," she said.
Gupta added that, "Indian RNA extraction kits are now available in good number, RT-PCR kits by 11-12 indigenous vendors are now being used, we are now in a comfortable position with respect to ttesting, due to identification and hand-holding of domestic players.”
She also pointed out that 681 labs are conducting tests currently. “At least , 681 laboratories have been approved for conducting COVID-19 tests. Of these, 476 are in the government sector and 205 in private sector, as of 1 June 2020. Today, we are conducting 1 lakh 20 thousand tests every day," she added.
Commenting on whether India has entered the community transmission phase, Gupta said, "Instead of using the word community transmission, it is important to understand the extent of spread of the disease and where do we stand in comparison with other countries."
"We are very far away from the peak. Our preventive measures to curtail the disease are very effective and we are better positioned in comparison with othercountries. You will get to see the data in a week," she asserted.
Recently, a group of health experts had in their report submitted to Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said that India is witnessing community transmission in few areas and if not contained in time can result in vast spread of the disease.
