Rajasthan calls off COVID-19 tests after kits register low accuracy rate

The doctors at Sawai Man Singh hospital in Jaipur raised red flags when only two out the 1,232 people tested with the RTK were diagnosed as being infected with coronavirus disease, but when those tested negative were retested with Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) kits most of them turned out to be positive for the disease.

Jaipur:The Rajasthan government on Monday put on hold the COVID-19 tests from the recently received Rapid Test Kits (RTK) after witnessing an accuracy rate as low as 5.4 percent instead of the expected 90 percent.

“The accuracy rate of these kits were 5.4 percent instead of the expected 90 percent...which is close to zero. So we wrote to the ICMR and said that we will not use these kits anymore because we are doubting its accuracy. We are awaiting a response from ICMR,” state health minister Raghu Sharma told ETV Bharat.

The doctors at Sawai Man Singh (SMS) hospital in Jaipur raised red flags when only two out the 1,232 people tested with the RTK were diagnosed as being infected with coronavirus disease, but when those tested negative were retested with Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) kits most of them turned out to be positive for the disease.

Rapid test kits

A team of doctors from the Microbiology and Preventive social medicine department of the SMS hospital then examined the Rapid Test Kits (RTK) and a report on the same was sent to the health ministry, which then wrote to the ICMR flagging its concern.

Rajasthan became the first state in the country to carry out rapid testing for COVID-19 last Friday and was set to receive one lakh more testing kits soon.