Coronavirus: Government begins sero-survey in selected districts to closely monitor spread | India News

NEW DELHI: In order to more closely monitor the prevalence and spread of Covid-19 in the country, the Ministry of Health has initiated a facility-based surveillance in all districts and a population-based “serological survey” more high. – and low-risk groups in selected districts.
The surveillance will add to routine tests according to current guidelines, the ministry said. The move becomes important as it will not only help the government and its agencies monitor Covid-19 trends, but will also verify community broadcast anywhere in the country.

A sero-survey involves testing the blood serum of a group of individuals and this will be used to monitor trends in the prevalence of the novel. coronavirusor SARS-COV-2, infection at the district level. Surveillance will be carried out by the Indian Council of Medical Research and the National Center for Disease Control in collaboration with key stakeholders and state health departments.
Facility-oriented surveillance is an expansion of government-conducted influenza and severe respiratory testing in hospitals. The improved exercise will see 10 health facilities, six public and four private, from each district that will be tested.
Until now, the health ministry has maintained that there is still no evidence of community transmission in the country. There are large outbreaks in some groups, but the strong exponential increase in cases such as in community transmission has not happened and the government’s containment strategy aims to prevent such a situation from developing, he said.
For the serological survey, the population groups will consist of low and high risk populations. The low-risk group will include ambulatory assistants (patients without ILI) and pregnant women, while healthcare workers will be surveyed among the high-risk population.
The survey will include a total of 200 samples per week and 800 samples per month. This will include at least 100 samples per week and 400 per month from selected districts of the high-risk population. For the low-risk population, 50 samples should be collected per week and 200 samples per month from outpatients (patients without ILI).
Agencies will use a combination of RT-PCR and Elisa antibody kits for these surveys. Throat and nasal samples will be taken for RT-PCR testing and samples analyzed in a single group of 25. However, the results of this group of samples are for surveillance purposes only and not for the diagnosis of individual patients, he said. the ministry.
“In addition to nasal / throat swabs, blood samples should be collected to detect IgG antibodies for Elisa tests. In subsequent rounds, IgG serum tests with serum samples will replace RT-PCR based tests for surveillance purposes, “the ministry said.
The Elisa test kit has been developed by the National Institute of Virology in Pune together with Zydus Cadila. The kit is expected to play a critical role in monitoring a proportion of the population exposed to the infection, after China’s rapid antibody test kits failed ICMR quality tests. Joint Secretary of the Ministry of Health Lav Agarwal He said that Elisa’s kits have a specificity of 97% and a sensitivity of 92%.
The Covid-19 research consortium formed by the Department of Biotechnology and the Biotechnology Industry Research Assistance Council has recommended 70 proposals to fund vaccines, diagnostics, therapies and other technologies, Agarwal said.