UP TEST LABS OVERBURDENED
There are only 33 laboratories testing for Covid — and concentration (most are in the big cities) of testing facilities in UP is making people wait for days to know their status.
LUCKNOW: Sunil Bansal, a resident of Varanasi, was first tested for Covid-19 on May 17.
His sample returned a positive report on May 28, 11 days later. Since then, he has been in an isolation facility in the Pandeypur area of the city. Another sample of his was taken on June 5, when he was deemed cured. “It’s five days now, but the report hasn’t come. I can’t leave the centre until the report comes,” said Bansal, a pharmacist who was on railway station duty when he tested positive.
The number — there are only 33 laboratories testing for Covid — and concentration (most are in the big cities) of testing facilities in Uttar Pradesh is making people wait for days to know their status.
Experts say this is worrying; they point to another cause for concern — UP has currently tested only 1,740 people per million residents, lower than the national average of 3,797 and far below other states. Maharashtra has done 4,730 tests per million for instance; Tamil Nadu, 8,206; and Rajasthan, 6,860.
To be sure, the state does average of 12,500 tests per day but this is well short of what is needed, the experts said. Uttar Pradesh has a population of 224 million, according to Census of India projections.
State surveillance officer Dr Vikasendu Agrawal said, “UP’s per case testing ratio is better than several other states. The state has reported 11,610 cases till now.”
Like Bansal, all samples from Varanasi, are tested at Banaras Hindu University (BHU). The same lab also tests samples from Sonbhadra, Mirzapur, Jaunpur,
Bhadohi, Ghazipur, Mau, Azamgarh and Ballia districts, which collectively have a population of about 25 million. The lab can test a maximum of 330 samples in a day.
The situation at BRD Medical College in Gorakhpur is similar. The Meerut testing centre, at Lala Lajpat Rai Medical College, tests samples from the adjoining districts of Baghpat, Saharanpur, Shamli, Muzaffarnagar, Bulandshahr, Ghaziabad, Noida, Bijnor and Hapur.
Out of the total 34,000 samples tested this far in the Meerut lab, 16,132 were from Meerut and 17,868 of other districts. On paper, the average time taken for testing samples is 68 hours, a little short of three days.
The lab at Jawaharlal Nehru MedicalCollege(JNMC),Aligarh Muslim University, caters to the districts of Kasganj, Hathras, Etah, Mathura, Badaun and Aligarh.This lab has thus far conducted more than 16,000 tests.
In Agra, a hotspot of the coronavirus disease, the labs are at Sarojini Naidu Medical College and Jalma Institute for Leprosy & Other Mycobacterial Diseases. There are also three private labs. Cases from nearby districts too reach Agra.
Lucknow has seven government labs and the reporting time is between 24 and 36 hours for coronavirus samples. KGMU’s microbiology lab tests around 1,200 samples each day.
UP HAS TESTED ONLY 1,740 PEOPLE PER MILLION RESIDENTS, WHICH IS LOWER THAN THE NATIONAL AVERAGE OF 3,797