NEW DELHI: With Delhi witnessing a spike in the number of Covid-19 cases, Delhi government has started ‘
targeted testing’ with the festive rush in mind. District officials said that apart from the existing testing facilities, they are now reaching out to people through mobile testing vans.
The number of fresh Covid-19 cases has been hovering around 7,000 for the past few days and Delhi recorded its highest single-day spike till date — 7,178 — on Friday. Delhi health minister
Satyendar Jain told TOI on Friday that apart from aggressive contact tracing of those testing positive in Covid-19 tests, targeted testing has also started. He said that testing in markets and other busy locations has begun.
“We want to give the opportunity to everyone to get tested and are also bringing it to the doorstep of people. While anybody can just walk into a dispensary and get tested, we have increased outreach to markets, malls and various other locations,” Naveen Aggarwal, dstrict magistrate, southwest told TOI. Aggarwal said that as part of the increased outreach programme, more mobile testing vans have been deployed in the district.
“We have considered mobile testing vans for two purposes. First of all, the mobile testing van acts as an IEC (Information Education Communication) activity in itself. When the van reaches a market location, people working at or visiting that area get more sensitised,” Aggarwal said.
Aggarwal said that the van helps carry out more tests as anybody who has symptoms or has doubt that they may have come in contact with someone who is infected, they can get tested. “Also, those who might not want to come to a dispensary or hospital, seeing the mobile van right in front of a shop, think of getting tested,” he said.
“Keeping in mind the
festive season, we had started rationalising our resources from mid-October. We had set up testing camps in busy markets earlier as well as the camps are put up on a rotational basis but now the focus is back on markets as the footfall has been going up,” a southeast district official said.
District authorities are also planning to rope in more Market Welfare Associations for setting up of temporary camps where rapid antigen tests of both shop owners and customers would be carried out. Testing vans are also likely to be deployed at busy bus stands and outside metro stations.