NEW DELHI: Aam Aadmi Party leader Sanjay Singh on Saturday demanded that the Central government should change the current guidelines set for Corona testing to make sure that everyone can get tested.
Singh wrote a letter to the Ministry of Health demanding that the protocol of testing set by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) be reviewed.
“I have written a letter to Health Minister Harsh Vardhan demanding a change in the current testing guidelines set by the ICMR. We believe anyone who feels that there are symptoms of the disease should be able to get tested at the nearest lab, hassle-free. More licences should be given to labs as this will help in finding out the real numbers of cases in the country, which will be beneficial in the long run because more people will go for home isolation if they find out about the disease,” said Singh.
These views were supported by the Delhi government as well. Earlier in the day Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain echoed Singh’s thoughts. “Delhi is conducting enough tests, but there are protocols of ICMR that we have to follow, we cannot flout these norms,” said the health minister.
The Delhi government claims that approximately 5,000 Corona tests are conducted in the national capital daily. Experts though argue that the current testing rate is not enough with projections predicting more than five lakh cases by the end of July.
Over the past few days, the administration has identified banquet halls, stadiums and hotels to be used as Covid Care Centres. CM Arvind Kejriwal had recently said that he would make sure that all arrangements are in place to provide treatment to corona patients in the national capital.