NEW DELHI: Drug Controller General of India, on Thursday, slapped show-cause notices on firms that hold import licences for rapid antibody kits of Chinese companies - Guangzhou Wondfo and Zhuhai Livzon.
The central drug watchdog’s action comes after the Indian Council of Medical Research’s finding that these kits of Chinese make have shown wide variation in their sensitivity in the field.
While 5.5 lakh such kits were distributed to various states for ramping up COVID 19 surveillance, within two days of disbursing them, ICMR asked the states to return the ‘faulty’. ICMR also said that these would be returned to the suppliers.
The Centre in a briefing on the outbreak condition, meanwhile said that the doubling rate for COVID-19 cases has improved to 11 days in the country as against the 3.4 days before the lockdown was imposed and the case fatality has come down at 3.2 per cent.
Lav Agarwal, joint secretary in the Union Ministry of Health Ministry also said that doubling rate of COVID-19 cases in several states is better than the national average.
A doubling rate of between 20-40 days is being seen in Karnataka (21.6), Ladakh (24.2), Haryana (24.4), Uttarakhand (30.3) and Kerala (37.5), Agarwal said.
A doubling rate of over 40 days has been noted in Assam (59), Telangana (70.8), Chhattisgarh (89.7) and Himachal Pradesh (191.6), he added.
He stressed that despite the improved overall doubling rate of a state, there can be some districts in it where the cases are doubling at a faster pace.
"And thus, it is important to ensure that we continue to work in a focused manner in the identified hotspot areas, along with the other parts of the country," he said
In India 65 per cent of all those who have succumbed to COVID-19 so far have been males.
An analysis of the age distribution of the deaths shows that 14 per cent case fatality was seen below 45 years, 34.8 per cent between 45-60 years while the case fatality above 60 years has been over 51 per cent.
"Further, if we divide the mortality cases above 60 years, then we see that the mortality has been 42 per cent in the age group of 60-75 years and 9.2 per cent in those above 75 years," Agarwal said.