The COVID-19 testing in Mysuru has been ramped up with more than 100 per cent target achieved since Wednesday.
The surge comes after the government asked the district administration to carry out more testing in the wake of the infection rate spiking exponentially besides an upsurge in deaths.
Consequently, the district administration sought two-weeks’ time to show the results and the ramping up of testing across the district.
Deputy Commissioner Rohini Sindhuri said testing was unsatisfactory all through the month of September. As against the target, 45 per cent testing was done last month. Testing is critical to identify infected persons early and give them treatment. Besides, it prevents the spread of the infection among the community, she said.
Ms Sindhuri said Mysuru is now doing more testing and has started achieving more than 100 per cent target. On Wednesday, 124 percent testing was achieved.
She said special testing teams had been constituted and officers had been posted to Mysuru city as well as various places in the districts to coordinate and ensure successful testing.
Mysuru is now divided into four zones for COVID-19 management and senior officers will be monitoring the situation with the help of field teams. “We are at it and all efforts are being made to control COVID-19 in Mysuru,” she said.
Meanwhile, the district administration has urged the public to wear masks, maintain social distancing and avoid crowding. The public should also focus on maintaining hand hygiene using hand sanitizers and washing hands with soap.
Health Department sources told The Hindu that the tests were expected to go up further ahead of the Dasara festivities with Minister for Health B. Sriramulu and Minister for Medical Education K. Sudhakar, who were in Mysuru in the last two days to review the COVID-19 situation, asking the health authorities here to take extra precautions and go into a combat mode when the city goes into the festive mode soon despite the celebrations being low key.
The word of caution from the Ministers amidst rapid surge in cases resulted in massive jump in testing with the opening of new testing centres. Also, new centres, including one at the University of Mysore, are being identified to maximize the testing and control the spread. “The testing may even touch 10,000 a day by the end of this month,” said a senior health official, who is into COVID-19 management.
As against the target of 1,400 rapid antigen tests (RATs) on Wednesday, 3,436 RATs were done, exceeding the target by 245 per cent. The number of persons tested positive after RATs was 336.
With regard to RT-PCR testing, the target was 3,100 but 2,130 PCR tests were done, which was below the target, at 69 per cent. And the number of persons tested positive from PCR tests was 286. But, overall, the testing target had been exceeded with 5,566 tests done over 4,500 targets, achieving 124 per cent target. The total number of positive cases detected on Wednesday was 622.