ICMR fixed upper cap price for Antigen testing kit to Rs 450

ICMR Director-General Dr Balram Bhargava in a letter to Union Health Secretary Preeti Sudan informed her that the ICMR has negotiated the upper price cap of the Antigen detection tests for Covid-19 to Rs 450. He also informed her that Delhi may deploy this test immediately in the containment zones.

New Delhi: The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has negotiated the upper price cap of the Antigen detection tests for Covid-19 to Rs 450, ICMR Director General Dr Balram Bhargava has informed to Union Health Secretary Preeti Sudan.

In a letter written to Sudan, Bhargava said that Delhi may deploy this test in the containment zones at the earliest.

Referring to Sunday's two back to back meetings of Home Minister Amit Shah with Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and subsequently with Delhi mayors, Dr Bhargava said that it was critical to immediately augment Covid-19 testing capacity in containment zones of Delhi to prevent the spread of infection.

"Currently, Delhi has 40 RT-PCR testing labs in both public and private sector. In addition there is a high throughput COBAS system now at NCDC. The overall testing capacity of Delhi today is close to 18000 samples per day," Dr Bhargava said.

He said that ICMR and AIIMS independently evaluated the stand alone rapid point of care antigen detection assay for quick detection of SARS-CoV-2 developed by SD Biosensor with manufacturing unit at Manesar.

Dr Bhargava said that symptomatic individuals who test negative in antigen test should be definitely tested sequentially by RT-PCR to rule out Covid-19 infection, "whereas a positive test should be considered as a true positive and does not need reconfirmation by RT-PCR test."

Meanwhile, Union Health Ministry in a guidelines addressing stigma associated with Covid-19 reiterated that this pandemic is a public health emergency that is causing a stressful and a difficult time for everyone.

"During this crisis, rumours and misinformation create more stress and can hamper Covid-19 recovery," the advisory issued on Tuesday said.

It suggested that lack of adequate information, fear of the disease and rumours and misinformation are the three major factors of stigma.

"People affected with Covid-19 and their families, people under quarantine, frontline health workers, people recovered from Covid-19 mostly face the stigma," the ministry said.

Meanwhile, during the last 24 hours 10,215 people were cured from Covid19 in India taking the total number to 180012 with a total percentage of 52.47.