Delhi limits access to Covid testing

NEWDELHI: The Delhi government on Tuesday released a document underlining its new testing strategy which counter-intuitively restricts the access to the tests even as the number of cases in the state continue to grow. The new guidelines make the testing criteria in Delhi tighter than those issued by the ICMR on May 18.

The change means that direct contacts of infected people that are asymptomatic will be tested only if they have co-morbidities or are senior-citizens between Day 5 and Day 10 of coming in contact with a confirmed Covid-19 case. The co-morbidities listed in the order are diabetes, hypertension, and cancer. A senior citizen is one over the age of 60 years.

“What this means is only those asymptomatic people who have co-morbid conditions will now be tested. The earlier category allowed for the testing of family members living in the same house or doctors and health care workers exposed to a Covid-19 patient even if they were asymptomatic. Most of the cases – around 70% -- were picked up in family members tested. Now, the government is allowing the testing of only those who have symptoms,” said an official at one of the government-covid-19 testing laboratories in the city.

Another doctor confirmed that this would exclude all asymptomatic contacts who do not have any co-morbid conditions.

All cities in Maharashtra, the state most severely affected by Covid-19, for instance follow ICMR guidelines for tests.

The change will only make it more difficult for asymptomatic people that have been exposed to infected people to be tested. Delhi ended Wednesday with 23,645 cases of which 9,542 have recovered and 606 have died. It added 1,513 new cases on Wednesday.