Centre blames Maharashtra for slow RTPCR tests for detecting COVID

Amid rising COVID cases in Maharashtra, the Union Health Ministry on Tuesday (April 13) said the state government was not testing enough. Health Secretary Rajesh Bhushan said in a press briefing that pandemic cases in Maharashtra have “grown significantly” and have reached a high of over 57,000 cases a day.

“The state’s test-per-million figure is also growing. But it is not keeping pace with the growth of average daily cases,” Bhushan said.

Another area of concern, he said, was that the share of RT-PCR tests in the total number of tests in the state has been decreasing as the case increased. The RT-PCR test is considered the most reliable tests to detect COVID-19. “If you look at the share of RC-PCR tests, it is progressively coming down. That is something concerning. We request the state to address this,” Rajesh Bhushan said.

The Health Secretary said an ideal ratio of RT-PCR versus Rapid Antigen tests is 70:30 (70 per cent RT-PCR tests and the rest Rapid Antigen tests).

Maharashtra’s weekly share of RT-PCR test was 57.6 per cent in the week April 7-13. This was a sharp decline from 70.3 per cent, the figure for the week February 17-23.

Also read: Maharashtra has 5 times more active COVID cases than 6 nearby states combined

“The Rapid Antigen tests are a screening test for areas that are crowded or are seeing new clusters. But those who test negative in this test have to mandatorily be subjected to RT-PCR test,” Rajesh Bushan said.

“We have reasons to believe that if proportion of RT-PCR tests goes up, then case positivity rate may also show a corresponding increase. But this is not something specific just to Maharashtra. It is for all states seeing a surge in cases,” said the Health Secretary.

On the other hand, state’s guardian minister of Mumbai blamed cricketers and celebs for the shortage of beds in hospitals, saying they were occupying beds despite having no serious COVID symptoms.

Aslam Shaikh said personalities from the film industry and cricketers have occupied beds in major private hospitals for longer periods, resulting in the shortage of beds.

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“Some celebrities from the film industry and cricketers had mild symptoms or were asymptomatic, but they got themselves admitted to major private hospitals and occupied beds for longer periods,” PTI quoted Aslam Shaikh as saying.

Aslam Shaikh said the government has issued several steps to curb the spread of the virus, but it has not happened. “Even after several strict guidelines, cases of coronavirus are not declining and therefore more strict guidelines will be imposed. The chain is not breaking,” he said.