To ensure that all positive cases are brought to the authorities for isolation, quarantine or treatment at the earliest, the Government has decided to keep a number of tests being done in the States. It has asked them to upload rapid antigen testing data on the ICMR portal on real-time basis.

In a letter to all States and Union Territories, ICMR DG Balram Bhargava said that “with the use of rapid antigen tests, more and more tests are being carried out and therefore, is absolutely necessary that all such testing data is uploaded on the ICMR database on real-time basis.

“It is expected that to provide safe healthcare services, all government hospitals/labs as well as all private NABH/NABL hospitals/labs may initiate antigen testing and also apply for obtaining login credentials for data entry into the ICMR portal.”

Antigen test is a promising tool for quick diagnosis of COVID-19. ICMR has advised the use of this test for quick detection of COVID-19 patients in containment zones and hospitals.

In an effort to facilitate and further liberalise testing, lCMR has generated five common login credentials for each district of each State/UT, which may be shared with all the Government and private facilities selected for antigen testing. Dr

Bhargava pointed out that in this Covid-19 pandemic, to ensure that testing is further enhanced and reporting of the same is done seamlessly states should identify all government and private facilities who would be providing COVID-19 diagnosis through antigen-based assays.

The ICMR has also asked the states to ensure that all the antigen testing points are appropriately linked with RT-PCR facility, where symptomatic negatives will be tested.

The Union Health Ministry said that ramping up of testing capacity has resulted in more than 3 lakh tests being conducted per day. In the last 24 hours, 3,33,228 samples have been tested while the  cumulative number of 1,30,72,718 samples tested has resulted in 9473 testing per million for the country.

Starting from one diagnostic lab in Januray 2020, the country has 1244 labs today, with 880 labs in the government sector and 364 in the private sector, said the official.

Bhargava said ICMR has been receiving multiple requests from various public sector units, small private and Government facilities, temples, etc for initiating rapid antigen testing.

“The key strategy to save lives and protect livelihoods remains ‘tests, track, treat’. Our continuous endeavour is to increase testing capacity and provide more and more access to people for testing. ICMR recently approved a point-of-care rapid antigen test for diagnosis of COVID-19, in addition to the already existing molecular diagnostic tools,” the ICMR head said in the letter.