Karnataka: SARI & ILI victims to be tested for Covid

BENGALURU: Reversing its order on testing the deceased for Covid-19, the state government on Wednesday said it would resume conducting tests on those who die with ILI or SARI symptoms.
The U-turn came on a day TOI frontpaged a report, ‘Experts: No test for dead can leave viral trail hidden’, in which doctors and public health experts expressed concern that such a decision could lead to under-reporting and keep cluster infections hidden. The state government, in its revised testing protocol released on Monday, had dropped death with influenza-like illness (ILI) and severe acute respitatory infection (SARI) from among the criteria mandating testing.
On Wednesday, the government said bodies will be swabbed within six hours of death for testing. If the result is positive for Covid, all contacts of the victim will be tested as primary contacts. Several medical experts, including Dr CN Manjunath, nodal officer for testing in the Covid-19 taskforce, had opined that testing those dying of Covid-19 symptoms would help trace their contacts and break the chain of transmission.
Officials, however, had defended the decision, claiming that it was in sync with the Centre’s directives.
Sources said the chief secretary decided to reintroduce the ILI/SARI testing clause on Wednesday morning. Later in the day, the state health and family welfare department issued an addendum to Monday’s testing protocol, directing tests for “suspected Covid-19 death with history of influenza-like illness, severe acute respiratory infection symptoms”.
“Swab to be taken within six hours of death,” said the addendum issued by Jawaid Akhtar, additional chief secretary in the health and family welfare department.