Rajasthan stops rapid testing, Health Min says accuracy of ICMR testing kit 'questionable'

Following West Bengal's claims of 'faulty testing kits' being provided by Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), Rajashtan government w has reiterated same. Rajasthan Health Minister Raghu Sharma has stated that accuracy of COVID-19 rapid testing kits provided by ICMR was supposed to be 90% but has been found to be just 5.4%. Consequently, Health Minister stated that it will t conduct any more rapid tests for Coronavirus and has written to ICMR about same.

Health Minister Raghu Sharma stated that government had formed a committee with Head of state's Microbiology Department and chief of Medicine department to check if tests are effective.

He added that ICMR guidelines for testing were followed and since it did t meet standards, so state has stopped rapid tests. "We've written to ICMR that we won't conduct it as accuracy is questionable. We're waiting for a reply," Sharma said. 

READ | WB CM Mamata Banerjee Issues '7 Days Work, 7 Days Off' Directive For Covid Health Workers

So far, 1576 positive COVID cases have been reported in Rajasthan with 205 of m recovering from disease. 25 deaths have also been reported in state due to pandemic.

READ | 'West Bengal Govt Trying Hard To Turn Covid-19 Red Zones Into Green Zones': Med Expert 

Bengal pins delay on ICMR

Earlier, West Bengal Health and Family Welfare Department had accused ICMR-NICED of providing defective testing kits to state government which has led to a delay in providing results of COVID-19 suspects. In a series of tweets on Sunday, Health Department had alleged that testing kits supplied by ICMR-NICED about two weeks ago has started to show a large number of 'inconclusive results.' department also reasoned that testing kits which were received by National Institue of Virology, Pune did t depict such a problem. 

Following allegations, Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR)'s Dr Gangakhedkar, on Monday, had said that se tests were to kw trend of spread of virus. He had also refuted West Bengal's claim of 'faulty test kits provided by ICMR', explaining that test kits had to be stored under 20 deg celsius. "In West Bengal, some RTPCR kits t working is what we have been informed. re is only one problem that kits should be kept under 20-degree Celsius, orwise, results may t be correct. We have informed WB govt that NIV kits are capable to conduct 10,000 tests," he said. 

READ | ICMR Refutes Bengal Govt's Claim On 'faulty Test Kits', Affirms Anti-body Tests For Survey