Noida: One held for ‘illegal’ Covid-19 sample collection, lab denies allegations

NOIDA: Two people, including the owner of a private laboratory in Delhi, have been booked and one of them was arrested for allegedly collecting samples for Covid-19 tests without informing the health department officials.
The accused had allegedly come to a private hospital in Noida to take samples of a suspected patient. When the health department got the information, the officials called the police and the collection agent was arrested.
Meanwhile, the private lab has denied the allegations saying that they are accredited by the ICMR for sample collection. According to the FIR lodged in Sector 20 police station, a lab based in Delhi’s Dwarka was carrying out sampling for Covid-19 illegally. “Deepak, a resident of Delhi’s Nawada, was caught collecting a sample for Covid from a private hospital in Sector 30. The lab has not followed various guidelines, including no quarantine facility for the patient, no sample collection centre in Noida, no ID with the sample collection agent, was violating sections of the Biomedical Waste Management Act, 1998,” read the contents of the FIR lodged against the agent and the owner of the laboratory Dr Deepak Sadwani under IPC sections 270, 269, 188 and section 3 of the Epidemic Act, 1897.
The CMO could not be reached for comment.