NS COVID-19 The Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) constituted by the Karnataka government has subsequently reminded to ensure that the daily testing targets are met with around 50,000 samples out of the total 1.1 lakh tests recommended by November, to be taken from Bengaluru alone.
The government had set a target of getting 1.5 lakh tests per day, but the numbers are varying between 78,958 (October 4) and 1,69,319 (October 2).
Indian Express Spoke to several District Health Officers (DHOs), who admitted that the daily testing target for their respective districts has not been met for almost a month now. “People seem to have created a rift in sharing the details of their contacts these days, with many symptomatic patients not willing to go for self-testing. This has affected contact tracing to a great extent because in most cases, the number of contacts we can capture is limited to less than 10 these days,” said a DHO from a district in north Karnataka on the condition of anonymity .
Meanwhile, Dr V Ravi, virologist and TAC member, said that it was ideal that the ratio of 1:20 should be maintained for contact with patients across the state. “It is imperative that we stick to the basic priorities when it comes to tracing and testing. While we maintained a 1:40 contact tracing ratio during the first wave, the priority at present should be to test all symptomatic people, which is being implemented with an aggressive approach in tracing contacts. More tests should be done in areas where clusters are reported,” he said.
However, the TAC in its latest report to the government has lowered the set target of 1.5 lakh to 1.1 lakh, citing a below 0.5 per cent drop in the overall test positivity rate (TPR) in the state.
“With the general decline in the number of cases, there has been a demand for revision of testing targets,” the report said, citing the expert panel’s observation that around 40 per cent of the total cases identified daily are from Bengaluru urban alone. are from.
It also noted that five districts (Bagalkot, Gadag, Haveri, Koppal, Raichur and Yadgir) were reporting zero cases for several days. The two districts reporting the highest TPR as on October 9 were Chikkamagaluru (1.25 per cent) and Hassan (1.04 per cent).
The TAC has also recommended that shortfall in testing targets could be bridged by drawing random samples including inter-state arrivals from Kerala and Maharashtra, home delivery workers, crowded markets, shopkeepers and restaurant workers at railway stations and bus stands.
Meanwhile, the panel further reiterated that 10 per cent of the samples taken in districts should be of children attending offline classes in schools.
According to the Karnataka Covid-19 War Room, over 35,000 people per million have been tested in the last 10 days in three districts of the state. These are Bengaluru Urban (46,963), Kodagu (39,301), and Dakshina Kannada (38,982).
Till date, the state has tested over 4.9 crore samples in total, of which over 3.4 crore were tested in 2021 alone. Overall, over 92.59 lakh (18.87 per cent) have been tested using the Rapid Antigen (RAT) method.
The TAC report said, “In case of shortfall in meeting the testing targets, there is a need for overcrowded population and closed markets, shopkeepers, caterers, restaurant workers, home delivery workers, inter-state arrivals from Mahand among others.” Random samples should be tested.” where did it go.
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