ICMR officials give training to health workers of Meerut division ahead of massive antigen tests
Ahead of starting antigen based Covid-19 testing in Gautam Budh Nagar, Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) trained health department officials and laboratory technicians in Noida on the new testing strategy.
The Council on Tuesday expanded the testing norms, advising that all hospitals, offices and public sector units be enabled to conduct rapid antibody tests, and recommending the deployment of rapid antigen tests in all containment zones, and hospitals and private labs across the state.
With 15,000 rapid antigen test kits in their kitty, the district administration has constituted 10 teams to identify high risk groups, influenza like illness symptoms (ILI) and co-morbidities. They have also been told to conduct massive special testing drives, particularly in the containment zones.
District magistrate Suhas LY said that as per the ICMR guidelines, it is now recommended to use Standard Q Covid-19 Argentum detection test as a point of care diagnostic assay.
“Since containment zones are high-risk areas, it will help there in testing in the containment zones as well as hospitals in combination with the reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test. All the 10 teams have been asked to identify the high-risk areas and conduct as much tests as possible to identify maximum number of Covid-19 positive cases. These dedicated teams will help in early tracking, containment and reduction of mortality rate,” he said.
He further said that all the health officials have been asked to focus to test, track and treat Covid-19 patients. “Since it is imperative to explore the existing antigen-based assays as point-of-care tests for early detection of Coronavirus, the test will prove as a boon as it is very specific with moderate sensitivity,” he said.
Meanwhile, with 98 new Covid-19 positive cases on Wednesday in the last 24 hours, the overall count of the district has now gone to 1,673 cases.
GB Nagar district chief medical officer (CMO) Dr Deepak Ohri said that as many as 47 positive patients were cured and discharged from different hospitals by Wednesday. “So far, altogether 996 patients have been cured and discharged from different facilities in GB Nagar. Besides, 19 Covid-19 positive patients have lost their lives in the district. As a result, the district now has 654 active cases,” he said.