The sample testing for coronavirus has gone for a toss with a number of discrepancies creeping into the process, resulting in inordinate delay in getting the results. Allegations are also being made that false certificates are being generated without collecting the samples.
The Hindu accessed one such certificate with its sample ID: 20253647, in which the collection of swab time was mentioned as 7.42 a.m. on April 22 and test result was generated at 7.05 p.m. It has turned out that the person did not submit any sample on that day, but approached a middleman who arranged for the certificate for ₹600. The person needed to produce a COVID-negative RTPCR certificate for some purpose.
‘Wrong data’
The person claimed that he had submitted a sample at the GGH, Anantapur on April 18 and was given a sample ID 20077819. However, he said, wrong age and place of the collection were mentioned in the data. “I did not receive the result either on my phone or on enquiring at the GGH counter till April 22. As I needed the certificate, I approached the middleman as suggested by the people working at the sample collection centre there,” said the person, on the condition of anonymity.
This is not the single such case. A journalist from Dharmavaram working with a vernacular daily submitted a sample some eight days ago after he had symptoms of fever, cold, and cough. He did not get the result till April 22. On Friday, he was informed that he tested positive .
In Anantapur too, a majority of the people The Hindu contacted, had got their results 48 hours after submission of samples. Many of them claimed that their personal details were mentioned wrongly.
Show-cause notices
“After The Hindu published a report on the delay in COVID19 sample data entry at the GGH, some employees have been served show-cause notices and additional staff have been deployed,” said Joint Collector A. Siri.
When this issue was brought to the notice of Collector Gandham Chandrudu on Friday evening, he said that the administration was in the process of streamlining the testing process and was recruiting additional trained staff. “We will probe into these specific complaints and take appropriate action,” he said.