Day Twentysix


Pune: 180 people made to sit for four hours for defying lockdown norms

 Mumbai is changing the testing protocol. BMC has decided to selectively test asymptomatic high-risk people, against the ICMR guidelines to test all asymptomatic high-risk contacts between the 5th and 14th day of suspected exposure. Reason? “Most of the asymptomatic people are getting tested unnecessarily resulting into negative results.”

Mumbai is also changing the protocol for reporting death. Every COVID death will be audited before being confirmed as one. So much obfuscation with protocol and statistics to get good optics. Government is not concerned about death so long as the reason is not COVID. Highly likely that going forward, government may disown deaths due to comorbidities, even if coronavirus was the trigger. That will leave the senior citizens in the lurch.

ICMR’s defence of the criticism of low testing rate (per million population) is incredibly juvenile. They argue that 350 districts in the country do not have any cases and hence tests per million is not a proper metric for India. It can be argued that these districts have no cases because there is no or insufficient testing. In India 1 in 24 is testing positive. The corresponding numbers for UK, USA and Italy are 3.4, 5.3 and 6.7. Such an astounding difference has to be scientifically explained to be believed. If this is the result of a more stringent lockdown, the cases will soar when it is lifted.

Somehow, ICMR doesn't inspire confidence. Why isn't the Director addressing the press everyday, like Fauci does in US? ICMR should be in the forefront of disseminating correct scientific information. ICMR is also sluggish in giving approvals for new clinical trials. Hospitals in Pune and Kerala are still awaiting the green light on Plasma Therapy. 

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