Covid-19: Trichy to test 600 people from Saturday

TRICHY: The district administration has planned to scale up Covid-19 testing in the city to 600 tests per day from Saturday, from the current average of 300-350 per day.
With 10 lakh population, Trichy Corporation’s testing rate was identified as one of the lowest for major cities in the state since Madurai and Coimbatore tested more than 1,000 people per day in recent weeks. Following public pressure, 1,145 samples were tested on July 2 across the district. Of them, 426 tests were conducted in the city, the highest so far in recent weeks.
Official sources said that Trichy Corporation has informed all medical officers in 18 urban primary health centres (UPHCs) to test up to 50 people per day, a majority will be symptomatic cases. “Our capacity is to conduct 1,000 tests per day. The testing rate was already increased. From July 4, we will increase the testing further,” district collector S Sivarasu said. Corporation sources said that adequate kits were dispatched to all UPHCs to collect swabs.
This apart, all the 65 bill collectors with the civic body were provided with thermal forehead thermometers for door-to-door inspections to identify fever cases in at least 100 houses per day. Those who have symptoms will be asked to give samples at the nearest UPHC. Instead of conducting fever camps, the civic body opted door-to-door screening.