Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal inaugurates first genome sequencing lab at Lok Nayak hospital

Chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, in the presence of health minister Satyender Jain, inaugurated the first laboratory under the Delhi government to sequence genomes of Sars-CoV-2 virus that causes Covid-19 at the Lok Nayak hospital on Wednesday. The lab, which has one sequencing machine, will start with eight to ten samples a day and expand the capacity to test more than 40 samples per day.

“We hear about new variants emerging in news every day. So far, we were dependent on Centre’s NCDC lab to sequence the samples. Now, Lok Nayak will also sequence the Covid-19 virus and look for variants that are causing the infections in the city. This will help us frame a strategy to tackle the problem,” said Kejriwal at the inauguration.

The other lab, which can test up to 400 samples a week, will be inaugurated on Thursday at the Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences. The lab has two machines for genomic sequencing that were used for other viral research so far.

“Currently, the researchers are working on standardising the data, after which the capacity will be increased to 40 to 50 samples a day,” said Dr Suresh Kumar, medical director at Lok Nayak hospital.

The labs together aim to sequence 5% of the samples that return positive in the RT-PCR test to keep an eye on concerning mutations that might lead to a surge in Covid-19 cases in future. So far, Delhi depended on the labs at National Centre for Disease Control and Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, that are part of the Indian SARS-CoV-2 Genomics Consortium (INSACOG).

“With the Central labs sequencing samples from across the country, there was always a delay of two to three weeks in getting results of the samples sent for sequencing. At the beginning of the year, when the UK variant was first detected, our hospital was the designated centre for isolating such cases and it took long to get their reports,” said Dr Kumar. Lok Nayak had admitted 140 patients with UK variant in its special isolation ward. The hospital did not receive any patient who contracted the South African or Brazilian variant of Covid-19.

The hospital has formed an inter-department committee that will refer random samples and samples of patients with atypical symptoms for genomic sequencing.

“If we receive Covid-19 cases where the symptoms are different or the patient is taking long to recover, the samples will be sent for sequencing in addition to random sampling of admitted patients from within the hospital. We will also receive samples from the districts for sampling,” said Dr Kumar.

The districts currently send some samples of mild, moderate, and severe Covid-19 cases, along with cases of re-infection, and infection after vaccination to INSACOG for sampling. The two labs by Delhi government will now share the load of testing samples.