Covid-19: 50K rapid testing kits, 30K PPEs ordered

Prepping to face a major challenge of ensuring testing in densely-populated areas, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) will procure 50, 000 rapid testing

Prepping to face a major challenge of ensuring testing in densely-populated areas, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) will procure 50, 000 rapid testing kits to identify people infected with Covid-19. The finger prick antibody test provides results within 30 minutes.

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The BMC has also decided to airlift personal protective equipment (PPE) for all medical health professionals and frontline staff.

The rapid testing kits are said to be helpful in slums and other congested areas in the city which can be hot spots or containment zones.

Civic officials said that the kits will also be used for medical staff, to ensure their safety. Nearly 15, 000 frontline workers across the city have to be screened on an immediate basis. While 12,000 PPEs have already been airlifted from Coimbatore, 30,000 more will be airlifted on Thursday. To ensure smooth transport and quick availability of the PPEs, a manufacturing unit is being set up in Navi Mumbai to supply the equipment. Officials said that a major concern is the safety of medical staff in constant contact with patients.

“The requirement of PPEs is 35,000 to 40,000 per week. The unit to be set up in Navi Mumbai will hopefully ensure ease in meeting the requirements. All of this is being done free of cost, using corporate social responsibility (CSR) funds,” said a civic official.

The BMC also has plans to procure nearly 400 ventilators to deal with the shortage. Recently, 35 ventilators were procured through CSR. “We have placed orders for more ventilators but due to unavailability in the market, we will have to wait a little longer,” said the official. Around 450 Mylab kits that can conduct 45,000 real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests are also being supplied through CSR.