BHUBANESWAR: For the first time children will be part of the nation-wide serological survey to be conducted this month by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR).
Three districts in Odisha (Ganjam, Rayagada and Koraput) will be part of this nationwide survey.
The ICMR with the help of the state governments is conducting this survey to know the prevalence of the coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) in the country after the second wave of Covid-19.
Regional medical research centre (RMRC) of the ICMR has planned to start the serological survey from June 16 or June 17 and continue till June 22.
ICMR-RMRC director Sanghamitra Pati said children above six years will be the part of the sero survey.
It will be conducted in the selected three districts with the logistic help of the state government.
“We have identified 10 clusters in each district for this survey,” she added.
She said a family will be randomly selected from a cluster and samples will be collected for the serological survey.
“This survey will help us to know the prevalence of antibodies and guide us to make a strategy to tackle the Covid-19 situation in the state and country in future,” she added.
The RMRC with the support of the state government has already conducted state-level sero surveys last year.
It had started this survey at Puri in June last year.
Later it conducted the survey at Bhubaneswar, Berhampur, Baramba-Narasinghpur, Rourkela, Paralakhemundi, Malkangiri and Cuttack.
RMRC and BMC had conducted this survey thrice in Bhubaneswar last year.
First phase of the survey was conducted between July 11 and July 28.
Sero prevalence was only 1.42 per cent in this survey.
Second survey was conducted in the last week of August last year with antibody prevalence of 5.15 per cent only.
The third phase survey conducted between October 16 and October 18 last year had revealed that antibodies had formed in 50 per cent of the city’s population.
Out of all surveys, the state government had found the highest antibody prevalence among Paralakhemundi people.
The survey conducted between September 16 and September 18 last year revealed that around 65 percent of Paralakhemundi’s population had developed antibodies against Coronavirus.
However, the sero survey conducted between August 3 and August 7 in Berhampur city of Ganjam district had revealed that antibodies were formed in 31.1 per cent of city’s population.
Odisha: Kids to be part of sero survey soon
