HYDERABAD: An expert committee of the Telangana government has levelled serious charges against private laboratories conducting Covid-19 tests. According to the committee, the labs are not using trained staff to collect samples which may lead to contamination and not uploading the exact number of tests conducted. This, according to the government, has led to Telangana reporting a much higher positivity rate than other states.
The expert committee, comprising senior microbiologists and officials from the health department, has said that the practices are such that the labs may not only give false positive reports but also expose people and their staff to the deadly Covid-19.
The committee has recommended stringent action against some of the labs for violating norms and not following guidelines The experts said that there was a possibility of the state reporting a high positivity rate because the private labs were not following set standards and protocols. “ICMR has also asked Gandhi Medical College to conduct quality control tests for private labs,” director of health, Dr Srinivasa Rao, said in an official statement released on Friday evening.
Panel checked data and lab registers
At one of the labs in a major hospital, the actual number of tests conducted were 3,940 but they have uploaded only 1,568 tests and shown 475 as positive. In view of this, the positivity rate is very high which is actually less if the number of all tests done is uploaded,” the statement says.
The committee looked at various aspects at 16 labs like infrastructure, human resources, infection control measures and general hygiene. The members also went through the registers and the data uploaded by the labs into ICMR and the state portal.
Other major findings included staff not wearing PPEs and those collecting samples not having the protection of safety cabinets. “There is clear evidence that the staff conducting the tests have not been trained properly in RTPCR testing for COVID-19,” Rao said. It was suspected that some labs were indulging in pool testing, where they collect samples from a particular area and declare the entire cluster as positive even if a handful of samples test positive. The government said private labs should not use such methods and only test individuals.
The committee said they also found disparity in the data entered on ICMR and state portals. “Some Labs are conducting tests for walk-ins, advertising that samples will be collected from different places in the city while government guidelines prescribe that only symptomatic cases and patients admitted in hospitals should be tested,” the government statement said.
The panel will conduct inspections with senior microbiologists checking the amplification plots and other data in RTPCR machines of private labs to check whether the reports are correct or not.
The expert committee, comprising senior microbiologists and officials from the health department, has said that the practices are such that the labs may not only give false positive reports but also expose people and their staff to the deadly Covid-19.
The committee has recommended stringent action against some of the labs for violating norms and not following guidelines The experts said that there was a possibility of the state reporting a high positivity rate because the private labs were not following set standards and protocols. “ICMR has also asked Gandhi Medical College to conduct quality control tests for private labs,” director of health, Dr Srinivasa Rao, said in an official statement released on Friday evening.
Panel checked data and lab registers
At one of the labs in a major hospital, the actual number of tests conducted were 3,940 but they have uploaded only 1,568 tests and shown 475 as positive. In view of this, the positivity rate is very high which is actually less if the number of all tests done is uploaded,” the statement says.
The committee looked at various aspects at 16 labs like infrastructure, human resources, infection control measures and general hygiene. The members also went through the registers and the data uploaded by the labs into ICMR and the state portal.
Other major findings included staff not wearing PPEs and those collecting samples not having the protection of safety cabinets. “There is clear evidence that the staff conducting the tests have not been trained properly in RTPCR testing for COVID-19,” Rao said. It was suspected that some labs were indulging in pool testing, where they collect samples from a particular area and declare the entire cluster as positive even if a handful of samples test positive. The government said private labs should not use such methods and only test individuals.
The committee said they also found disparity in the data entered on ICMR and state portals. “Some Labs are conducting tests for walk-ins, advertising that samples will be collected from different places in the city while government guidelines prescribe that only symptomatic cases and patients admitted in hospitals should be tested,” the government statement said.
The panel will conduct inspections with senior microbiologists checking the amplification plots and other data in RTPCR machines of private labs to check whether the reports are correct or not.
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