Country allows on-demand Covid testing; what does it mean

Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, September 5

Amid the mounting COVID load, the government on Friday night issued updated testing guidance, which for the first time allows anyone to get a COVID test 'on demand' rather than the previous advisory which required medical prescriptions for any COVID test.

In the revised guidance exclusively reported by The Tribune on Saturday, the ICMR has said, “A totally new section has been added in the advisory. It is called ‘Testing on demand’, which for all practical purposes does away with prescription by a registered medical practitioner although state governments have the freedom to decide on simplified modalities,” the government said on Saturday.

The new section ‘Testing on demand (state governments to decide simplified modalities)’ will cover all individuals undertaking travel to countries or Indian states mandating a negative COVID-19 test at the point of entry and all individuals who wish to get themselves tested.

Also read: ICMR issues advisory allowing ‘testing on demand’ for COVID-19

The advisory also includes testing of asymptomatic people for the first time as a proof is now growing on asymptomatic carriers of the SARS-Cov2 virus.

The idea is to track the hidden infection as daily new cases cross 80,000 on an average.

“There has been an unprecedented upsurge in India’s daily testing capacities. For two successive days, more than 11.7 lakh tests have been conducted per day. A total of 4 crore and 77 lakh tests have been done so far across the country. There are now 1,647 testing laboratories operational which cover all states/UTs. It is in this background that the Health Ministry has issued the updated testing advisory,” said the government.

On recommendations of the National Task Force on COVID-19, the new advisory has further simplified the testing process and given more freedom and flexibilities to the state authorities to facilitate enhanced ease of testing for the people. 

For the first time, along with more simplified modalities, the updated guidelines provide for ‘On-demand’ testing in order to ensure higher levels of testing.

The advisory elaborates on the choice of tests (in order of priority) in various given settings.

In containment zones, the following will have to be tested—all symptomatic (influenza-like illness symptoms) cases, including health care workers and frontline workers; all asymptomatic direct and high-risk contacts (in family and workplace, elderly over 65, immune-compromised, those with co-morbidities) of a laboratory-confirmed case to be tested once between day 5 and day 10 of coming into contact; all asymptomatic high-risk individuals (elderly over 65, those with co-morbidities) in containment zones.

In non-containment areas, tests should be done on all symptomatic (ILI symptoms) individuals with a history of international travel in the last 14 days; all symptomatic (ILI symptoms contacts of a laboratory-confirmed case; all symptomatic (ILI symptoms) health care workers and frontline workers involved in containment and mitigation activities; all symptomatic ILI cases among returnees and migrants within 7 days of illness; all asymptomatic high-risk contacts (contacts in family and workplace, elderly over 65, and those with co-morbidities.

In hospital settings, COVID test is recommended for all patients of Severe Acute Respiratory Infection (SARI), all symptomatic (ILI symptoms) patients presenting in a health care setting, all asymptomatic high-risk patients who are hospitalised or seeking immediate hospitalisation such as immune-compromised individuals, patients diagnosed with malignant disease, transplant patients, patients with chronic co-morbidities, elderly over 65; asymptomatic patients undergoing surgical and non-surgical invasive procedures (not to be tested more than once a week during hospital stay), all pregnant women in/near labour who are hospitalised for delivery.