BIG WORRY: INFECTION SPEED GOES UP IN HARYANA, DOUBLING RATE IS NOW SIX DAYS

Number of samples taken and cases in ICMR records exceeds state’s stats

CHANDIGARH: Haryana recorded 2,091 coronavirus cases on May 31, a number that does not go with the data of the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and Union ministry of health.

The ICMR web portal, for the same day, showed two values for the total number of coronavirus cases – 2,875 and 5,529 while the health ministry showed 2,881 positive cases in the state. The ICMR and health ministry also got the sampling data from 12 government and seven private testing labs in the state.

Similarly, the total number of tests till June 1 stood at about 1.21 lakh as per the Haryana health department data. The ICMR data, however, showed that about 1.33 lakh samples were tested till June 1. In a nutshell, the numbers – sampling as well as positive casesreflected in ICMR records are higher than the state data.

The glaring discrepancies in the Covid-19 data have serious repercussions in terms of isolating the infected persons, contact tracing, surveillance, planning and strategy to tackle the situation. The data muddle has perplexed the state authorities who suspect an attempt to suppress the sampling data.

Additional chief secretary (ACS), health, Rajeev Arora said that a number of Delhi private labs having collection centres in Gurgaon and Faridabad did not share the testing data with the state. “If they do not share the data, how will we do the contact tracing,’’ the ACS said. Officials said that while the labs dispatched the data online to ICMR, they did not share it with Haryana. The health department in a communication to 18 ICMR approved private labs in Delhi asked them to mandatorily inform each positive case from Haryana to the civil surgeons.

“Private labs in Delhi were accepting samples from Haryana without government’s concurrence. These labs are not conveying results to health authorities even in case of positive results. There are wrong addresses, incorrect contact details which defy surveillance activities,’’ reads the communication.

Even as the data tangle remained partially sorted, the government on Tuesday flagged the issue with ICMR. “There are incomplete entries… wrong or incomplete addresses without contact details.. Aadhar details have been taken but the patient is not residing there. There are duplicate entries. If one person got tested at two labs, the ICMR showed two cases, as no unique ID was generated,’’ said a letter to the ICMR director. Chief minister ML Khattar said they have sorted out the mismatch, though confusion is far from being over.