Mumbai: Worried about Covid cases not reported, the state has asked the district and civil companies to monitor the sale of testing kits at home and ensure that people who use them report test results to the authorities.
They have been asked to work with food administration and medicines and rope chemists to educate users about the importance of registering results.
BMC is likely to come out with the guidelines for the home kit on Thursday.
The use of the Mandiri Test Kit has quickly seen a massive leap since the Omicron surge begins.
As a waiting time for the RT-PCR test soaring with swelling in the sample load, many of which switch to the managed test kit that can provide results in 15-20 minutes.
But given the reporting voluntarily voluntarily, most positive cases were not reported.
BMC was informed of nearly 98,000 tests from August to December.
Meanwhile, lakh kits have been sold in the city in the last 20 days.
Additional Chief Secretary Dr.
Pradeep Vyas destroyed a district official on Wednesday stating, “There seems to be a large number of positive Covid cases that have been tested on this kit but have not been reported to the authorities concerned and these people seem to be in house isolation.” It reminded that more malignant Delta variants were still found in 70% of samples sorted by the country, he wrote, “a fast antigen test generally does not distinguish between Delta and Omicron variants.
Thus, it might happen that many of Covid patients are isolated in this house Maybe it requires hospital care (especially those with deltas and comorbidities) and suddenly there is pressure on our health infrastructure.
“The state has requested local administration to bind with the FDA, monitor the sale of the kit through medical stores and understand the geographical area where They are used on a large scale.
“The shop owner of a chemistry can also be educated to notify the buyer kits to report positive results,” he said.
Supplementary City Commissioner Suresh Kakani said BMC plans to write to the head of the FDA on Thursday asking directions to chemical shops in Mumbai to provide data on home kit buyers.
BMC will provide data to 24 rooms, which will call the individuals.
However, a quick antigen kit will continue to be a mainstay of Covid’s diagnosis for now, said ICMR Head Dr.
Balram Bhargava on Wednesday.
He said home antigens and a quick antigen kit had become the backbone in the war against Omicron and who also save it as one of the main recommendations.
He said the antigen test could detect Covid between Day 3 and Day 8 exposure, which was a period of infection.
“Intimacy of test results on the ICMR portal is required,” he said, adding that India has the capacity to produce 18 lakh kits every day.
He doesn’t say how much consumed.
A chemist from the sea line said they sold 150-200 kits a day and maintaining records of each buyer could be a challenge.
“Many people buy it online, what about them?” she says.