7-10 day delay in RT-PCR results makes people desperate

MANGALURU: As the COVID19 cases surge in the district, RTPCR test results are taking 7-10 days to reach the people, adding to their stress levels and forcing them to approach private facilities.While results from private hospitals are available within 24 hours, government hospitals are taking 7-10 days or even longer.To check whether these complaints were genuine, this reporter went for a test at a public health centre at Bejai in Mangaluru on April 24, but the results are yet to come, even after 10 days.

People in urgent need of test results are returning from PHCs and government hospitals without getting tested as the staffers tell them that the RTPCR result would take a minimum of seven days. They are forced to approach private hospitals, which charge anywhere between Rs 800 and Rs 1,300 per test. An employee of a private hospital defended the rates, saying they give the results early. The New Indian Express had done a reality check on how private hospitals are fleecing Covid patients.

Health Department sources said that the results at government facilities are getting delayed as there is a big rush in the number of people going for tests. The doctors now request Covid-infected people not to go for a retest after 17 days of isolation, unless Covid symptoms persist.To tackle the delay in announcing test results, Deputy Commissioner KV Rajendra, after approval from the government, had allowed the district administration to send excess samples from government facilities to private laboratories. But the situation has still not improved, forcing people to go for repeat tests at private hospitals to get quick results.

Dr Sharath Kumar, nodal officer, Mangaluru Virology Research and Diagnostic Laboratory located at District Wenlock Hospital, said that despite a big surge in samples, they have been able to test almost all of them without much backlog and attributed the delay to updating the test results on the website. He said that the situation will be sorted out soon as they are streamlining and updating the data on the website. He said that though they have the capacity to test 1,400 samples a day, they are testing up to 2,500 samples by working round-the-clock.