Gurugram health dept starts antibody tests in Sohna

The health department on Monday started rapid antibody tests in Sohna and tested five persons with the help of Rapid Testing Kits (RTKs). The district health department has 750 RTKs which will be used in tracing people who have developed antibodies against the coronavirus disease (Covid-19)—i.e. they are asymptomatic or have mild influenza-like symptoms.

In a statement released by the administration, Amit Khatri, deputy commissioner, said, “The district has more than 700 RTKs, which will help find suspected Covid-19 cases. While the RT-PCR method takes at least two days, antibody tests give results in 15-30 minutes. The kits will be used in containment zones of the city to check for Covid-19 clustering.”

Officials said that the result of all five tests carried out at the sub-divisional hospital in Sohna on Monday was negative.

The district has six containment zones — Devi Lal Colony, Sun City Sector 54, Sector 39, Fazilpur village in Jharsa, Village Raipur in Sohna and Ward no. 11 Pataudi. The district health department has started the tests in Sohna’s containment zones after it reported 14 cases.

On Monday noon, the medical team at Sohna was trained in the usage of the kit. With the staff’s training complete, more people will be tested on Tuesday, officials said.

Dr Jaswant Singh Punia, chief medical officer, said, “With the help of RTKs, we can find out whether a person has developed antibodies against Covid-19. We are taking the blood samples of those with influenza-like illness. Once identified we will also do their RT-PCR tests for final confirmation. But those tested for antibodies will be quarantined for 10 days.”

On Friday, the Haryana government received its first shipment of 10,000 RTKs from the central government. As per the plan, blood tests to detect coronavirus antibodies through RTKs will be done at three Covid-19 hot spot districts — Gurugram, Nuh and Hathin in Palwal.

Haryana also received its first shipment of 25,000 RTKs from SD Bio Sensor, a Korean company based in IMT Manesar. Rajiv Arora, additional chief secretary, health department, said, “ We are the first state to receive bulk supply from our own sources. This will help speed up testing in containment zones, hot spots and asymptomatic cases.”