Delhi Has Adopted Target COVID Testing In Crowded Areas Amid Rising Cases: Here's How It Works
The Delhi government has been conducting targeted Covid-19 tests in markets and other crowded areas to strengthen its surveillance mechanism. This category of testing now accounts for 25-30% of new Covid-19 cases detected every day.?
What is target testing?
In targeted testing, samples are collected at regular intervals from a restaurant or a market place in an area from where high number of cases are getting recorded.?
How target testing is done?
It was decided to concentrate efforts in certain key areas, such as targeted RT-PCR testing in sensitive and critical zones such as restaurants, market places, barber shops and salons; gear up the availability of medical resources including beds, ICUs, and ventilators as a preemptive measure and ensure high degree of contact tracing along with monitoring of quarantined contacts so as to suppress and break the chain of transmission, Union Home Secretary Ajay Kumar Bhalla, in a statement, said.?
How is it different?
Heath Minister Satyendar Jain said the aim of target testing is to tackle COVID at places where safety protocols may not have been adhered to diligently. Jain also acknowledged that he was getting reports that many people were either lax in adhering to safety norms or not wearing masks at all. This is where target testing steps in.?
According to experts, if a person removes his facemask in a public place and the prescribed distance of two metre is not followed, then transmissibility of coronavirus increases. But the safe distance of two metre is difficult to maintain in market areas especially during the festive season, he said. Hence, target testing may help combating the outbreak in a controlled manner.?
Oxygen monitoring
Apart from targeted testing, the government has now also started targeting those being tested for their oxygen saturation levels.In case the oxygen saturation of a person getting tested was found to be less than 94%, such a person would have to be examined by a doctor mandatorily.
