Local testing camps held in areas that have seen a surge in COVID-19 cases have been helping with quick detection of the disease among symptomatic people.
In areas such as West Kochi, where cases had been persistently climbing since mid-July, testing camps had been set up under each of the four urban primary health centres, said a health worker from Fort Kochi.
Since testing could not be done at the health centre itself in order to protect other patients from a risk of infection, separate buildings have been identified with the help of the local ward councillor to conduct camps twice a week, she said. Each camp functions with two doctors, two staff nurses and two ASHA workers. “With the spread of the infection now, out of about 50 tests done in a day, at least ten will return positive results,” she said. While most tests done at such camps were antigen, some RT-PCR confirmatory tests were done, particularly after a wedding in the area had left many symptomatic primary contacts of patients, she added.
Including private ones, tests were being conducted at about 100 facilities in the district, helping with quick detection, said Mathews Numpeli, district programme manager, National Health Mission.
In Varapuzha, where a few workers in the vicinity of the market had tested positive recently, leaving several primary contacts, facilities for antigen testing were set up at a government school in the same ward, said a health official in the area. The panchayat made arrangements for the facility while the Health Department provided the staff, he said. Testing is usually done once a week at the camp which functions under the Varapuzha community health centre. If a symptomatic person was to be tested urgently, they were usually sent to another testing camp that might be running on the day, he said.
A list of primary contacts of patients is maintained by ASHA workers in the area and they are monitored daily for symptoms via phone. When the caseload was more manageable, all primary contacts were tested on the seventh day of quarantine, said the health worker in Fort Kochi. At present, only those primary contacts who reported symptoms, along with all other symptomatic persons, were required to get tested, she said.
In other areas like Alangad, which has also seen a consistent rise in cases scattered across the panchayat, a testing camp is held weekly at an auditorium which was rented to run a first-line treatment centre (FLTC). While the FLTC itself had not been functioning in the absence of staff, testing continued, mostly with staff from the primary health centre, said panchayat president Radhamani Jayasingh.
At Chellanam, two testing camps have been functioning since the area began to report cases in July, said a health official. To facilitate testing, the panchayat had arranged for vehicles to transport symptomatic people from their homes to the testing camps, he said.
Published - September 28, 2020 12:39 am IST
