Covid-19: An overhaul of public health infrastructure is needed.

Businessline
March 19, 2020
India needs to gear up its testing facilities and number of beds to deal with pandemics such as the coronavirus, which seem to break out once a decade, if not earlier.

At first glance, the extraordinarily low incidence of the novel coronavirus disease (Covid-19) in India, with 147 positive cases and three fatalities so far, would seem reassuring. However, it coincides rather too neatly with a low number of testing facilities. The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has, between March 1-15, availed of 51 of its 106 Viral Research Diagnostic Labs (VRDLs) for random testing 20 samples per lab, of patients suffering from Severe Acute Respiratory Infection (SARI) and Influenza Like Illness (ILI).

 As 500 tested samples turned out to be negative for Covid-19, the conclusion is that there is no community transmission yet, and the situation in India is way better than China or Italy. The ICMR Director Balram Bhargava has accordingly dismissed WHO Director General Tedros Ghebreyesus’ advice on “test, test, test” being the best way to control the Covid-19 pandemic.

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